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HATING.  HINDI* 


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«.   - 


METHOD  OF  THE  DIVINE    GOVERNMENT, 

PHYSICAL  AND   MORAL. 
BY  REV.  JAMES  M'COSH,  A.M. $2,00. 

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THE    METHOD 


OF 


THE  DIVINE  GOVERNMENT. 


PHYSICAL    AND    MORAL. 


BY 


REV.   JAMES  M'COSH. 


NEW   YORK: 

ROBERT     CARTER    &    BROTHERS, 
No.    285     BROADWAY. 

1851. 


CONTENTS. 


BOOK  FIRST. 

GENERAL  VIEW  OF  THE   DIVINE  GOVERNMENT  AS  FITTED  TO 
THROW  LIGHT  ON  THE  CHARACTER  OF  GOD. 

CHAPTER  I. 
INTRODUCTION. 

SECTION  I— Sonrces  of  our  Idea  of  God,      .....  9 

SECT.  II. — Object  of  the  Treatise ;  Investigation  of  the  Providence  of  God, 
and  the  Conscience  of  Man,  or  the  External  and  Internal  Govern- 
ment of  God,  ........  28 

CHAPTER  II. 

GENERAL  ASPECT  OF  THE  DIVINE  GOVERNMENT  •  .  PHENOMENA 
PRESENTED  BY  THE  PROVIDENCE  OF  GOD,  AND  THE  CON- 
SCIENCE  OF  MAN,  THOUGH  COMMONLY  OVERLOOKED. 

SECT.  I. — Instructive  Views  of  God  presented  by  His  Government,  .  88 

SECT.  II. — The  Existence  of  Extensive  Suffering,  Bodily  and  Mental,          .  87 

SECT.  III. — The  Restraints  and  Penalties  of  Divine  Providence,      .  .  48 

SECT.  IV. — The  Alienation  of  God  from  Man,          ....  47 

SECT.  V. — The  Alienation  of  Man  from  God,          .  .  .  52 

ILLUSTRATIVE  NOTE  (A). — The  Religious  History  of  Mankind,    .  65 

SECT.  VL— Schism  in  the  Human  Soul,        .....  66 

CHAPTER  III. 

THE  ACTUAL  WORLD,  AND  THE  VIEW  WHICH  IT  GIVES  OF  ITS 

GOVERNOR. 

SECT.  I. — Particular  Review  of  the  Five  Phenomena  before  specified,        .  68 

SECT.  II.— Other  General  Phenomena  fitted  to  throw  Light  on  the  Condi- 
tion of  the  World,  .......  W 


CONTENTS. 


BOOK  SECOND- 

PARTICULAR  INQUIRY  INTO  THE  METHOD  OF  THE  DIVINE  GOV- 
ERNMENT IN  THE  PHYSICAL  WORLD. 

CHAPTER   I. 
GENERAL  LAWS. 

SECT.  L— Properties  of  Matter— Different  Things  denoted  by  the  Phrase  PAe* 

"  Laws  of  Nature,"         .......  86 

ILLUSTRATIVE  NOTE. — Relation  of  Cause  and  Effect,          .  .  94 

SECT.  II. — Adjustment  of  the  Material  Substances,  with  their  Properties 

to  each  other,      ........  101 

SECT.  III. — Special  Adjustments  required  in  order  to  produce   General 

Laws  or  Results,  ....  112 

ILLUSTRATIVE  NOTE  (B). — Laws  of  Phenomena,  Causes  of  Phe- 
nomena, Conditions  of  the  Operation  of  Causes,  Review  of 
Whewell,         .  .  .  .  .  .  .  119 

SECT.  IV. — Wisdom  displayed  in  the  Prevalence  of  General  Laws,  and 
observable  Order  in  the  World,  Correspondence  of  External  Nature 
to  the  Constitution  of  Man,  Difference  of  Philosophy  and  Practical 
Sagacity,  Science  and  Art,         .....  126 

SECT.  V. — Connection  of  God  with  His  Works,        .  .  .  .  161 

SECT.  VI. — Infinite  Power  and  Wisdom  required  to  govern  a  World  so 

constituted  .  .  .  ...  159 

SECT.  VII. — Unity  of  the  Mundane  System,  ....  162 


CHAPTER  II. 

THE  PROVIDENCE  OF  GOD. 
SECT.  I. — Isolated  and  Fortuitous  Events  resulting  from  the  Adjustment 

of  Material  *Sub8tances  to  each  other,   .  .  .  .  .  167 

ILLUSTRATIVE  NOTE  (o). — Complexity  of  Nature,  Phenomena 
classified  according  as  they  are  more  or  less  Complicated, 
Review  of  the  Positive  Philosophy  of  M.  Aug.  Comte,  .  172 

SECT.  II. — Powerful  and  Varied  Means  furnished  by  these  Fortuities  for 

the  Accomplishment  of  the  Divine  Purposes,   .  .  .  .  181 

ILLUSTRATIVE  NOTE  (D). — Combe's  Constitution  of  Man,    .  .  193 

SECT.  III. — On  a  General  and  Particular  Providence,  .  .  .  196 

SECT.  IV. — Method  of  Interpreting  the  Divine  Providence,  .  .  201 

SECT.  V. — Practical  Influence  of  the  various  Views  which  may  be  taken 

of  Divine  Providence,  Atheism,  Pantheism,  Superstition,  True  Faith,  218 

SECT.  VI. — Method  of  answering  Prayer,  and  furthering  Spiritual  Ends,  226 

CHAPTER   III. 

RELATION  OF  THE  PROVIDENCE  OF  GOD  TO  THE  CHARACTER  OF  MAN. 
SECT.  I. — General  Remarks  on  the  Relation  of  the  Physical  to  the  Moral 

Providence  of  God,        .......  238 


CONTENTS.  7 

SECT.  IL — Control  which  God  has  over  Man  by  means  of  Physical  Ar-  PAQ* 

rangements,         .                                      ...  240 

SECT.  III. — Aids  to  Virtue,  and  Restraints  upon  Vice,         .            .            .  244 
SECT.  IV. — State  of  Society  when  the  Aids  to  Virtue  and  the  Restraints 

upon  Vice  are  withdrawn,          .                          ....  251 

SECT.  V. — Adaptation  of  this  World  to  Man,  considered  as  a  Fallen  Being,  259 
SECT.  VI. — Explanation  of  the  Mysteries  of  Divine  Providence,  furnished 

by  the  Sinfulness  of  Man's  Character,    .....  278 


BOOK  THIRD. 

PARTICULAR  INQUIRY  INTO  THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  THE  HUMAN 
MIND  THROUGH  WHICH  GOD  GOVERNS  MANKIND. 

CHAPTER  I. 

MAN'S  ORIGINAL  AND   INDESTRUCTIBLE   MORAL  NATURE. 

SECT.  I. — The  Will  or  the  Optative  Faculty. — Conditions  of  Responsibility,  273 

SECT.  II. — Responsibility  and  Freedom  compatible  with  the  Causal  Con- 
nection of  God  with  His  Works,  .....  279 

ILLUSTRATIVE  NOTE  (E). — Principle  of  Cause  and  Effect  in  the 

Human  Mind,  .......  291 

SECT.  III. — Distinctions  to  be  attended  to  in  Ethical  Inquiry,          .  .  294 

SECT.  IV. — Inquiry  into  the  Nature  of  Conscience,  or  the  Mental  Faculty 

or  Feeling  which  draws  the  distinction  between  Right  and  Wrong,    .  297 

SECT.  V. — Common  Quality  of  Virtuous  Action,       ....  812 

SECT.  VI. — Practical  Rule  to  be  followed  in  determining  what  is  Good  and 

Evil,        .  824 

SECT.  VII. — Tendency  of  Virtuous  Action,  ....  825 

SECT.  VIII. — General  View  of  Man's  Original  Moral  Constitution,  as  illus- 
trative of  the  Character  of  God,  ....  880 

CHAPTER  II. 
ACTUAL  MORAL  STATE  OF  MAN. 

SECT.  I. — Some  peculiar  Laws  of  the  Working  of  Conscience,  .  .  884 

SECT.  II. — Influence  of  a  Depraved  Will  upon  the  Moral  Judgments,  .  889 
SECT.  III. — Judgment  pronounced  by  the  Conscience  upon  the  Character 

of  Man,   ........  852 

SECT.  IV. — Farther  Inquiry  into  the  Virtuousness,  and  more  particularly 

the  Godliness  of  Man's  Character,  .  .  .  .  .  860 

SECT.  V. — Theory  of  the  Production  of  the  Existing  Moral  State  of  Man,  .  872 

SECT.  VI. — State  of  the  Conscience  in  the  Depraved  Nature,  .  .  878 
SECT.  VII. — Restraints  laid  upon  Man  by  the  Conscience— their  Extent  and 

Character,  .  .  .889 


VI  CONTENTS. 

PASS 

SECT.  VIII. — On  the  Evil  Effects  produced  by  a  Condemning  Conscience,  .  394 

SECT.  IX. — General  Review  of  Man's  Existing  Moral  Nature,          .  .  408 


CHAPTER   III. 

OTHER  GOVERNING  PRINCIPLES   OF  THE  HUMAN  MIND. 

SECT.  L — Governing  Principles  neither  Virtuous  nor  Vicious. — The  Appe- 
tites and  Instinctive  Desires,      ......  416 

SECT.  II. — The  same  Subject. — The  Affections,         ....  420 

SECT.  III. — Governing  Principles  that  are  Evil,        ....  425 

SECT.  IV. — Influence  exercised  by  these  Principles  in  biasing  the  Con- 
science,  .........  482 

ILLUSTRATIVE  NOTE  (F). — Human  Virtues  (so  called)  and  Vices 

running  into  each  other,          .....  440 

SECT.  V. — Summary  of  the  Argument  from  the  Combined  View  of  the 

Physical  and  the  Moral,  ......  446 


BOOK  FOURTH. 

RESULTS— THE  RECONCILIATION  OF  GOD  AND  MAN. 

CHAPTER  I. 
NATURE  AND  REVEALED  RELIGION -THE  CHARACTER  OF  GOD. 

SECT.  I. — Advantage  of  Harmonizing  Nature  and  Revelation,        .  .  447 

SECT.  II. — Prevailing  Defective  Views  of  the  Divine  Character,    .  ,  462 

SECT.  HI.— Character  of  God  as  Revealed  in  Scripture,       .  .  t  458 

CHAPTER  II. 

RESTORATION  OF  MAN. 

SECT.  I. — Symptoms  of  Intended  Restoration,          ....  464 

SECT.  II.— What  is  needful  in  order  to  the  Restoration  of  Man.— (1.)  In 

Relation  to  the  Character  of  God,          .....  469 

SECT.  III.— What  is  needful  in  order  to  the  Restoration  of  Man.— (2.)  In 
its  Relation  to  the  Character  of  Man.    The  need  of  an  Interposition  in 

the  Human  Heart  and  Character,  ....  474 

SECT.  IV. — Same  Subject  continued. — Means  of  applying  the  Aid,  .  481 

ILLUSTRATIVE  NOTE  (o).— The  German  Intuitional  Theology  >        .  499 

SECT  V.— The  World  to  Come,       ,  607 


PREFACE 


WE  live  in  an  age  in  which  the  reflecting  portion  of  mankind  are  much 
addicted  to  the  contemplation  of  the  works  of  nature.  It  is  the  object  of 
the  author  in  this  Treatise  to  "  interrogate  nature,"  with  the  view  of  making 
her  utter  her  voice  in  answer  to  some  of  the  most  important  questions  which 
the  inquiring  spirit  of  man  can  put. 

He  thinks  it  needful  to  state  thus  early  that  he  proceeds  on  the  inductive 
method  in  his  inquiry,  and  not  after  the  plan  of  those  British  Rationalists, 
on  the  one  hand,  who  set  out  with  a  preconceived  system  which  they  dignify 
with  the  name  of  Rational,  and  then  accommodate  all  that  they  see  to  it ; 
nor  of  those  German  Intuitionalists,  on  the  other  hand,  who  boast  that  they 
can  construct  the  existing  universe  by  a  priori  speculation. 

To  guard  against  misapprehension,  he  wishes  it  to  be  understood  that  he 
treats  in  this  book  of  the  Method  of  the  Divine  Government  in  the  world 
rather  than  in  the  Church  ;  of  the  ordinary  providence  of  God  rather  than 
his  extraordinary  dealings  towards  his  redeemed  people. 

The  reader  of  severe  taste  will  be  inclined  to  regard  the  Introductory 
Book  as  too  loose  and  discursive ;  and  all  the  apology  that  the  Author  has 
to  offer  is,  that  he  was  afraid  of  driving  back  the  general  reader,  by  leading 
him  into  the  minutiae,  before  he  had  contemplated  nature  under  its  general 
aspect. 

The  general  reader,  on  the  other  hand,  may  be  disposed  to  complain,  that 
the  style  of  discussion  followed  in  some  of  the  Sections  and  Notes  of  the 
Second  and  Third  Books  is  of  too  abstract  a  character.  He  has  to  justify 
himself  to  such  by  stating  that  he  did  not  feel  himself  at  liberty,  in  such  an 
age  as  this,  to  avoid  grappling  with  any  of  the  difficulties  that  fell  in  his  way ; 
and  he  has  attempted  to  confute  the  wrong  conclusion  drawn  by  a  superficial 
philosophy — by  the  principles  of  a  deeper  philosophy.  He  has,  in  most 


PREFACE, 

so  constructed  his  work,  that  the  general  reader  may  pass  over  the 
more  abstract  portions  (as,  for  instance  some  of  the  Illustrative  Notes)*  with- 
out losing  the  train  of  argument. 

It  is  due  to  the  memory  of  the  late  Dr.  Chalmers  to  acknowledge,  that 
had  not  the  author  enjoyed  the  inestimable  privilege  of  sitting  for  four  or 
five  sessions  at  the  feet  of  this  illustrious  man  in  the  University  of  Edinburgh, 
he  would,  in  all  probability,  never  have  had  his  thoughts  directed  in  the 
train  which  he  has  followed,  and  have  been  without  the  spirit  which  he  has 
sought  to  cultivate,  as  he  would  certainly  have  been  without  not  a  few  of 
the  principles  which  he  has  carried  along  with  him  in  his  investigations.  It 
is  with  no  feeling  of  presumption  that  he  regards  it  proper  to  add,  that  did 
he  not  imagine  that  he  had  some  truth  to  communicate  not  contained  in  the 
works  of  Dr.  Chalmers,  he  would  not  have  obtruded  himself  on  the  public 
notice,  as  it  could  never  have  occurred  to  him  that  he  was  able  to  state  the 
ideas  of  Dr.  Chalmers  so  clearly  or  impressively  as  he  has  done  himself  in 
his  works,  now  so  extensively  circulated. 

He  has  to  acknowledge  his  obligations  to  Principal  Cunningham,  to  Pro- 
fessor Buchanan,  and  to  the  Rev.  Dr.  Hanna,  for  the  kind  encouragement 
which  they  gave  him  to  proceed  with  this  work  when  submitted  to  them 
for  their  counsel ;  as  also  to  the  two  last-mentioned  gentlemen  and  the  Rev. 
John  Mackenzie,  Ratho,  for  their  judicious  assistance  in  overlooking  these 
sheets  as  they  passed  through  the  press. 
BRECHIN,  January  1850. 

*  For  example,  the  discussion  on  Cause  and  Effect  at  page  94. 


METHOD  OF  THE  DIVINE  GOVERNMENT. 


BOOK   FIRST. 

GENERAL  VIEW  OP  THE  DIVINE  GOVERNMENT  AS  FITTED  TO 
THROW  LIGHT  ON  THE  CHARACTER  OF  GOD. 


CHAPTER  I.— INTRODUCTION. 

SECTION  L— SOURCES  OF   OUR  IDEA  OF   GOD. 

SUPPOSE  that  the  sun,  rising  and  setting  as  at  present,  had  been 
perpetually  hid  from  the  eye  by  an  intervening  cloud  or  shade* 
which  concealed  his  body  without  obstructing  his  beams,  there 
might  still  have  been  a  universal  impression  that  a  great  luminary 
existed  as  the  cause  of  the  light  which  daily  illuminated  our  globe. 
Different  persons  might  have  fixed  on  different  objects  as  reflecting 
the  light  of  heaven  most  impressively  ;  some  on  the  fleecy  or  gilded 
clouds  ;  others  on  the  lively  verdure  of  the  grass  and  forests,  or  ou 
the  cerulean  ocean,  or  on  the  rich  grain  of  autumn  glistening  in 
the  yellow  beams ;  but  all  would  have  rejoiced  to  conclude,  that 
there  was  a  sun  behind  the  veil. 

Though  God  is  invisible  to  the  bodily  eye — though  he  is,  as  it 
were,  behind  a  veil,  yet  the  idea  of  his  existence  is  pressed  on  the 
mind  from  a  variety  of  quarters.  Were  it  not  so,  the  apprehension 
of,  and  belief  in,  a  supernatural  power  or  being  would  not  be  so 
universally  entertained.  The  mind  which  refuses  the  light  that 
comes  from  one  region,  is  obliged  to  receive  the  light  that  comes 
from  another  quarter  of  the  heavens  or  earth.  It  may  be  inter- 
esting to  trace  to  its  sources  the  most  important  conception  which 
the  human  mind  can  form. 


10  INTRODUCTION. 

FIRST,  THERE  is  THE  DESIGN  EXHIBITED  IN  THE  SEPARATE 

MATERIAL  WORKS  OF  GoD. 

An  acquaintance  with  the  depths  of  science  is  not  needful,  in 
order  to  enable  mankind  to  appreciate  this  argument.  Every  per- 
son who  has  observed  the  springing  of  the  grass  and  grain,  or  the 
budding  of  flowers,  or  who  has  taken  but  a  passing  survey  of  his 
own  bodily  frame,  or  of  the  sun,  moon,  and  stars,  has  had  the 
idea  impressed  upon  his  mind  of  reigning  wisdom  and  love.  The 
boy  who  has  marked  the  instincts  of  birds  in  building  their  nests; 
the  shepherd  who  has  watched  the  habits  of  his  flocks  and  herds, 
and  of  the  beasts  of  prey  that  attack  them ;  the  peasant  who 
has  attended  to  the  migration  of  the  swallow,  or  the  cuckoo,  or 
any  other  favorite  bird,  or  who  has  noted  the  working  of  bees 
— their  government  and  order  in  the  hive  in  which  he  and  his 
family  feel  so  deep  an  interest — has  seen  enough  to  constrain  him 
to  acknowledge  that  there  must  be  higher  intelligence  to  instruct 
these  creatures,  which  have  manifestly  nothing  in  themselves  be- 
yond blind  and  unreasoning  instinct. 

Socrates  representing  in  this,  as  he  did  in  everything  else,  the 
philosophy  of  profound  common  sense — such  as  shrewd,  observant, 
unsophisticated  men  in  all  ages  have  delighted  in — has  led  the 
way  in  the  statement  of  this  branch  of  the  evidence.  "  Is  not 
the  providence  of  God  manifested  in  a  remarkable  manner,  inas- 
much as  the  eye  of  man,  which  is  so  delicate  in  its  structure,  hath 
provided  for  it  eyelids  like  doors  for  protection,  and  which  extend 
themselves  whenever  it  is  needful,  and  again  close  when  sleep  ap- 
proaches?" uls  it  not  worthy  of  admiration  that,  the  ears  should 
take  in  sounds  of  every  sort,  and  yet  not  be  too  much  filled  with 
them?"  "That  the  fore-teeth  of  the  animal  should  be  formed  in 
such  a  manner  as  is  evidently  best  fitted  for  the  cutting  of  its  food, 
as  those  on  the  side  are  adapted  for  grinding  it  to  pieces?" 

It  is  pleasant  to  reflect  that  God  hath  so  arranged  his  providence, 
and  so  constituted  man,  that  it  does  not  require  an  acquaintance 
with  abstruse  science,  to  enable  mankind  to  attain  to  a  knowledge 
of  God.  But  while  scientific  knowledge  is  not  required,  in  order 
to  produce  the  conviction  in  the  first  instance,  it  is  gratifying  to 
find  that  physical  research  in  every  department  of  nature  multi- 
plies the  proof  by  exhibiting  an  indefinite  number  of  new  adap- 
tations. Every  new  discovery  in  science  yields  its  contribution 
to  the  proofs  and  illustrations  of  the  wisdom,  power,  and  goodness 
of  God.  This  scientific  argument  was  prosecuted,  as  far  as  an- 


SOURCES    OF    OUR    IDEA    OP    GOD.  11 

eient  science  admitted,  by  Cicero  in  his  Treatise  on  the  Nature  of 
the  Gods.  In  modern  times,  it  was  followed  out  by  Derham  and 
Ray;  at  a  later  date,  Paley  became  its  most  elegant  and  judicious 
expounder,  and  it  has  kept  pace  with  modern  science  in  the 
Bridgewater  Treatises  and  the  Fragmentary  Works  of  Sir  Charles 
Bell. 

There  is  nothing  abstruse,  or  complicated,  or  mysterious  in  the 
diain  of  reasoning  which  leads  us  to  believe  in  a  supernatural  in- 
telligence, or  rather  in  the  single  link  which  connects  the  works  of 
God  and  the  worker.  It  is  represented  by  Dr.  Thomas  Reid,  as 
containing  in  its  logical  form  two  propositions — the  major,  that 
design  may  be  traced  from  its  effects ;  and  the  minor,  that  there 
are  appearances  of  design  in  the  universe.*  It  is  one  of  the  most 

*  "  The  argument  from  final  causes,"  says  Dr.  Reid,  "  when  reduced  to  a  syllogism, 
has  these  two  premises.  First,  that  design  and  intelligence  in  the  cause  may  with 
certainty  be  inferred  from  marks  or  signs  of  it  in  the  effect.  This  is  the  principle  we 
have  been  considering,  and  we  may  call  it  the  major  proposition  of  the  argument. 
The  second,  which  we  call  the  minor  proposition,  is,  that  there  are  in  fact  the  clearest 
marks  of  design  and  wisdom  in  the  works  of  nature ;  and  the  conclusion  is,  that  the 
works  of  nature  are  the  effects  of  a  wise  and  intelligent  cause.  One  must  either  as- 
sent to  the  conclusion,  or  deny  one  or  other  of  the  premises."  (Essay  vi.  c.  vi.)  The 
French  Atheistical  School,  headed  by  M.  Aug.  Comte,  would  at  times  cast  doubts  on 
the  second  proposition,  and  explain  away  some  of  the  supposed  marks  of  design, 
dwelt  upon  by  writers  on  natural  theology.  But  hi  doing  so,  it  may  be  invariably  re- 
marked, that  they  only  succeed  in  referring  a  given  adaptation  to  a  more  general 
cause ;  and  they  do  not  seem  to  reflect  that  we  are  ready  to  follow  them  thither,  and  to 
point  out  the  adaptation  there,  possibly  under  a  double  form,  or  one  adaptation  adjusted 
so  as  to  produce  another.  When  we  point,  for  instance,  to  the  eye,  as  showing  such 
thought,  such  care,  such  refinement,  such  advantage  taken  of  the  properties  of  natural 
agents,  "  and  fitted,"  as  Sir  John  Herschell  remarks,  "  to  force  upon  us  a  conviction 
•of  deliberate  choice  and  premeditated  design,  more  strongly  perhaps  than  any  single 
contrivance  to  be  found  in  art,"  the  Atheist  contents  himself  with  saying,  that  the  eye 
is  produced  by  that  law  of  nature  according  to  which  children  resemble  their  parents ; 
and  he  forgets  that  we  follow  him  from  the  child  to  the  parent,  and  there  discover  the 
very  same  adaptation ;  with  this  farther  adaptation,  that  the  parent's  frame  is  so  con- 
structed as  to  be  able  to  produce  an  offspring  after  his  own  likeness.  And  all  the 
miserable  cavils  of  the  Atheistical  school  leave  a  host  of  traces  of  design  undenied 
and  even  untouched.  As  the  second  proposition  cannot  be  denied  with  any  appearance 
of  plausibility,  they  set  themselves  with  most  vigor  to  attack  the  first,  and  represent 
nil  the  apparent  traces  of  design  as  mere  "  conditions  of  existence."  "  The  provision 
made  for  the  stability  of  the  solar  system,"  says  M.  Comte,  "  is  no  evidence  of  a  final 
cause.  The  pretended  final  cause  reduces  itself,  as  has  been  seen  in  all  analogous 
occasions,  to  this  puerile  observation — there  are  no  stars  inhabited  but  those  that  are 
habitable.  They  return,  in  a  word,  to  the  principle  of  the  conditions  of  existence, 
which  is  the  true  positive  transformation  of  the  doctrine  of  final  causes,  and  of  which 
the  fertility  and  bearing  are  vastly  greater."  If  there  be  any  logical  force  in  this  r*- 


12"  INTRODUCTION, 

common  of  all  kinds  of  argument,  and  is  altogether  suited  to 
man's  habits  of  observing  and  thinking.  Every  man  is  obliged 
to  proceed  on  the  argument,  in  the  acquisition  of  necessary  secular 
knowledge,  and  the  discharge  of  the  ordinary  business  of  life. 

SECONDLY,  THERE  ARE  THE  RELATIONS  WHICH  THE  PHYSI- 
CAL WORLD  BEARS  TO  MAN,  WHICH  WE  CALL  THE  PROVIDENTIAL 
ARRANGEMENTS  OF  THE  DIVINE  GOVERNMENT. 

In  observing  these,  the  mind  rises  beyond  mere  isolated  mate- 
rial objects  and  laws,  and  even  beyond  the  relations  between  them, 
to  contemplate  the  grand  results  in  the  dealings  of  God  towards 
his  creatures.  It  is  to  this  latter  class  of  facts  that  the  majority 
of  mankind  look  rather  than  to  the  other.  An  extended  observa- 
tion of  the  nice  adjustments  in  material  objects  requires  a  kind  of 
microscopic  eye  and  a  habit  of  fixed  attention,  such  as  the  great 
mass  of  mankind  do  not  possess;  and  men  generally  look  not 
so  much  to  these  as  to  prominent  events  cognizable  by  the 
senses  without  any  minute  inspection,  and  which  indeed  force 
themselves  upon  the  attention ;  the  providential  care  of  God,  and 
the  restraints  of  his  government,  being  not  so  much  isolated 
adaptations  as  the  grand  results  in  their  bearings  upon  mankind 
to  which  these  adaptations  lead.  The  common  mind,  unaccus- 
tomed to  dissection,  can  prosecute  the  scientific  argument,  and 
the  observation  on  which  it  proceeds,  but  a  very  little  way ;  but 

mark,  it  must  be  held  as  affirming  that  no  adjustments,  however  numerous  and  strik- 
ingly applied  to  secure  an  end,  can  be  held  as  evidential  of  design.  Now,  let  us  apply 
this  to  the  common  illustration.  We  lift  a  watch,  found  lying  on  a  bare  common,  and 
examine  it,  and  are  about  to  conclude  that  it  must  have  had  a  maker,  when  M.  Comte 
comes  to  us  and  assures  us  that  all  this  adaptation  of  wheel,  and  axle,  and  notch,  and 
hand,  and  figure,  is  but  the  condition  of  the  existence  of  the  watch.  True,  it  is  the 
condition  of  the  existence  of  the  watch,  but  it  is  a  proof  too  of  a  designing  mind 
arranging  the  condition.  We  certainly  hold  the  remark  to  be  sufficiently  "  puerile," 
and  the  sneer  reared  upon  it  to  be  sufficiently  profane.  "  At  this  present  time,  for 
minds  properly  familiarized  with  true  astronomical  philosophy,  the  heavens  display 
no  other  glory  than  that  of  Hipparchus,  of  Kepler,  of  Newton,  and  of  all  who  have 
helped  to  establish  these  laws."  No  persons  were  more  willing  to  admit  than  the 
parties  now  named,  that  the  laws  which  they  discovered,  must  have  existed  before 
they  could  discover  them ;  and  that  the  glory  belongs  to  Him  who  established  these 
laws,  and  to  them  but  the  reflected  glory  of  having  first  interpreted  them  to  mankind. 
Onco  admit,  as  we  think  the  rational  mind  cannot  but  admit,  that  adjustments  towards 
a-  given  end,  if  sufficiently  numerous  and  striking  may  be  held  as  proving  the  ex- 
istence of  a  designing  mind,  and  the  number  and  nature  of  such  adjustments  in  the 
universe  will  at  once  force  upon  us  the  conclusion  that  this  world  has  a  presiding  intel- 
ligence.—(See  Pos.  Phil.  vol.  ii.  pp.  28,  39.) 


SOURCES    OF    OT7R    IDEA    OF    GOD.  13 

this  other  it  can  pursue  to  a  great  length.  Inquire  into  the  ground 
of  the  belief  in  the  existence  of  God,  entertained  by  the  working 
man  or  man  of  business,  and  you  will  probably  find  it  not  an  in- 
genious observation  of  his  own  frame,  or  of  any  material  object, 
but  of  the  care  which  God  takes  of  him,  and  the  judgments  with 
which  from  time  to  time  he  visits  the  world.  It  is  this  latter  ob- 
servation which  falls  in  most  readily  with  his  habitual  train  of 
thought  and  feeling,  and  which  comes  home  most  powerfully  to 
his  heart  and  experience. 

The  argument  under  this  second  head  is  not  different  in  its 
logical  nature  from  the  former ;  but  the  class  of  objects  on  which 
it  is  founded  is  different.  And  it  is,  as  we  apprehend,  the  class 
of  phenomena  now  referred  to,  which  raises  the  mind  to  the  idea 
of  a  God  above  nature  and  ruling  over  it.  "  As  the  considera- 
tion, of  nature,"  says  a  sagacious  thinker,  "shows  an  inherent  in- 
telligence, which  may  also  be  conceived  as  coherent  with  nature, 
so  does  history,  on  a  hundred  occasions,  show  an  intelligence 
which  is  distinct  from  nature,  which  conducts  and  determines 
those  things  which  may  seem  to  us  accidental ;  and  it  is  not  true 
that  the  study  of  history  weakens  the  belief  in  a  divine  provi- 
dence. History  is  of  all  kinds  of  knowledge  the  one  which  tends 
most  decidedly  to  that  belief."*  There  is  ground  for  the  remark 
here  made,  both  as  to  the  effect  usually  produced  by  the  contem- 
plation of  nature,  and  the  impression  left  by  the  intelligent  con- 
templation of  history.  He  who  confines  his  attention  to  the  mere 
structure  and  laws  of  physical  nature,  is  apt  to  speak  and  think 
of  God  as  merely  a  kind  of  intelligent  principle  inherent  in,  and 
coherent  with,  nature.  It  is  when  we  contemplate  the  dealings 
of  God  towards  the  human  race,  whether  in  the  events  of  past 
history,  (to  which  Niebuhr  more  particularly  refers,)  or  in  those 
which  fall  under  our  observation  and  experience,  that  we  rise  to 
the  idea  of  a  God  distinct  from  nature  and  above  nature,  control- 
ling and  governing  it.  "God,"  says  Leibnitz,  "has  the  qualities 
of  a  good  governor  as  well  as  of  a  great  architect."t  The  physi- 
cal inquirer  discovers  the  qualities  that  indicate  the  former  of 
these,  and  speaks  of  God  as  a  great  architect,  or  an  ingenious 
mechanician,  or  an  unrivalled  artist.  It  is«  from  a  survey  of  the 
events  of  providence,  being  the  combination  and  results  of  those 


*  Niebuhr's  Lectures,  vol.  i.  p.  146. 

f  Essays  on  the  Goodness  of  God.— P.  iii. 


14  INTRODUCTION 

laws  which  the  man  of  science  investigates  severally,  that  we  rise 
to  enlarged  views  of  the  Governor  of  the  universe. 

THIRDLY,  THERE  is  THE  HUMAN  SOUL  WITH  ITS  CONSCIOUS- 
NESS, ITS  INTELLIGENCE,  AND  ITS  BENIGN  FEELINGS. 

A  reference  is  made  to  these  at  present,  not  as  the  agents  by 
which  the  process  of  proof  is  conducted,  but  as  the  objects  con- 
templated, and  on  which  the  proof  rests.  The  human  reason 
must  be  the  instrument  employed  in  every  branch  of  the  argu- 
ment, and  whatever  be  the  data  on  which  it  proceeds ;  but  in 
the  case  now  before  us,  the  reason  finds  its  data  in  the  mind? 
itself. 

"  It  is  never  to  be  forgotten,  that  apart  from  a  reflex  contempla- 
tion of  the  human  soul,  it  is  impossible  to  rise  to  the  conception 
of  a  living  and  intelligent  God.  It  is  in  the  human  soul,  small 
'though,  it  be  when  compared  with  the  object  reflected,  that  we  are 
to  discover  most  distinctly  represented  the  image  of  a  spiritual 
,God.  Without  taking  human  consciousness  and  intelligence  and 
feeling  into  view,  God  could  be  conceived  of  as  a  mere  principle 
of  mechanism,  or  order  in  nature,  or  a  power  of  fate,  or  a  law  of 
development  above  nature,  (as  with  Schelling,)  rather  than  a  real 
;uid  living  agent.  It  is  the  possession  of  consciousness  and  intel- 
ligent purpose  by  man  that  suggests  the  idea  of  a  conscious  and 
n  personal  God.  From  what  we  have  ourselves  experienced,  we 
know  that  intelligence  is  needful,  in  order  to  produce  such  effects 
as  exist  in  nature  around  us  ;  and  thence  we  rise  in  our  concep- 
tions to  a  living  soul  presiding  over  the  universe  and  regulating 
it,  not  according  to  a  mere  law  of  mechanism  or  development,  but 
by  the  wisdom  of  spiritual  intelligence  and  love. 

The  very  existence  of  the  human  soul  as  a  created  object,  which 
it  evidently  is,  implies  an  intelligent  soul  as  its  creator,  and  that  a 
soul  of  a  prodigious  compass  of  power  and  intelligence.  If  the 
creation  of  the  beautiful  forms  of  matter  argues  an  extraordinary 
power  and  skill,  does  not  the  creation  of  spiritual  intelligent  being, 
impress  us  still  more  with  the  knowledge  and  wisdom  of  the  Cre- 
ator? 

Some  think  that  the  proof  of  the  existence  of  God,  derived  from 
the  human  soul,  can  be  stretched  much  farther  ;  and  they  find 
among  the  depths  of  the  human  mind,  and  among  its  necessary 
ideas,  what  they  reckon  the  most  solid  and  conclusive  of  all  argu- 
ments. The  attempt  of  this  nature  in  a  former  age  by  Newton 


SOURCES    OF   OUR    IDEA   OF    GOD.  15 

and  Clarke  in  this  country,  is  now  generally  regarded  as  unsuc- 
cessful ;  but  the  failure  of  these  giant  intellects  has  not  prevented 
the  German  philosophers,  and  those  French  writers  of  the  Eclec- 
tic School,  who  have  entered  so  much  into  the  German  spirit,  from 
boldly  renewing  the  attempt  made  by  the  schoolmen  to  construct 
an  argument  for  the  Divine  existence,  from  ideas  independent  of 
all  experience.  In  such  metaphysical  disquisitions,  it  is  often  dif- 
ficult to  determine  whether  the  discussion  does  not  turn  upon 
mental  abstractions  rather  than  realities.  In  this  treatise,  at 
least,  we  are  not  disposed  to  push  the  argument  farther  than  the 
mind  can  easily  follow  it.  We  are  contemplating  the  arguments 
which  do,  in  fact,  lead  mankind  in  general  upwards  to  the  con- 
ception of  a  supernatural  power,  rather  than  those  speculations 
which  may  carry  conviction  to  those  who  habitually  dwell  in  the 
profundities  of  abstract  philosophy.  For  the  purpose  at  present  in 
view,  it  is  enough  to  insist  that  it  is  by  the  human  consciousness 
and  intelligence  that  the  idea  of  a  personal,  a  spiritual,  and  an  all- 
wise  God  is  suggested,  and  by  which  there  is  furnished  the  most  con- 
vincing evidence  of  His  being  and  some  of  His  highest  perfections. 

FOURTHLY,  THERE  ARE  THE  MORAL  QUALITIES  OP  MAN. 

We  refer  more  particularly  to  the  conscience.  This  conscience 
is  in  all  men.  Man  has  not  only  powers  of  understanding,  such 
as  the  memory,  the  imagination,  and  the  judgment ;  not  only  feel- 
ings and  emotions,  such  as  love,  hope,  fear — he  has  likewise  a 
higher  faculty  or  sense,  which  judges  by  its  own  law  of  every 
other  principle  of  the  mind,  and  claims  authority  over  it.  Just  as 
all  men  think  and  reason  by  the  powers  of  the  understanding, 
and  as  all  men  feel  by  their  emotional  nature,  so  all  men  have 
some  sense  (it  may  be  very  faint  and  imperfect)  of  the  distinction 
between  good  and  evil,  by  means  of  the  moral  power  or  powers 
with  which  God  has  endowed  them. 

For  the  proof  of  the  existence  of  the  conscience,  we  appeal 
with  Butler  and  Mackintosh  to  the  consciousness.  We  have  only 
to  compare  our  nature  with  that  of  the  brute  creation,  to  discover 
at  once  that  there  is  some  such  principle  in  the  human  mind. 
The  lower  animals  we  find  so  far  resembling  man,  that  they  are 
possessed  of  certain  appetites  and  propensities,  but  they  have  no 
regulating,  in  short,  no  moral  principle.  Following  their  impulses 
spontaneously,  they  gratify  them  ;  and  no  blame  attaches  to  them, 
and  they  feel  no  reproaches  or  compunctions  of  conscience.  But 


16  INTRODUCTION. 

let  man  proceed  to  gratify  the  appetites  and  passions  of  his  nature 
to  excess,  and  in  an  irregular  way,  and  he  meets  with  some  check, 
(it  may  be  a  feeble  one,)  warning  him  at  the  time,  and  followed 
by  reproach  ;  something  which,  if  it  does  not  proclaim  aloud,  at 
least  whispers  in  accents  loud  enough  to  be  heard,  that  he  is  doing 
wrong.  Unable,  it  may  be,  to  stem  the  strong  current  of  the  evil 
passions,  this  conscience  is  yet  like  a  breaker  placed  in  the  midst 
of  the  stream,  which  if  it  does  not  stop  the  torrent,  at  least  an- 
nounces  its  own  existence  and  its  purpose  by  the  agitation  which 
it  produces. 

Now,  the  conscience  is  a  ready  and  powerful  means  of  suggest- 
ing the  idea  of  God  to  the  mind.  We  believe  that  it  is  by  it, 
rather  than  by  any  careful  observation  of  nature,  material  or 
spiritual,  that  mankind  have  their  thoughts  directed  to  God.  It  is 
not  so  much  by  what  he  sees  around  him,  as  by  what  he  feels 
within,  that  man  is  led  to  believe  in  a  ruler  of  the  world.  A  con- 
science, speaking  as  one  having  authority,  and  in  behalf  of  God, 
is  the  monitor  by  which  he  is  reminded  most  frequently  and 
emphatically  of  his  Governor  and  his  Judge. 

It  seems  to  be  possible  to  build  upon  the  very  fact  of  the  exist- 
ence of  the  conscience,  an  independent  argument  in  favor  of  the 
being  of  God.  The  existence  of  the  law  in  the  heart  seems  to 
imply  the  existence  of  a  lawgiver. 

Whatever  may  be  thought  of  this,  it  is  certain  that  the  con- 
science affords  evidence  that  God,  proven  on  other  grounds  to  ex- 
ist, must  approve  of  moral  excellence.  We  are  constrained  to 
believe  that  he  who  planted  the  conscience  in  our  bosoms,  loves 
the  virtue  which  it  would  lead  us  to  love.  We  are  forced  to  the 
conclusion,  that  he  who  stirred  up  these  reproaches  in  our  breasts, 
himself  hates  the  sin  which  they  would  lead  us  to  hate.  By  the 
analogy  of  human  design,  we  infer  in  the  universe  the  operation 
of  a  mightier  designer ;  and  by  the  analogy  of  man's  moral  sen- 
timents, we  conclude  that  the  Creator  of  the  universe  is  possessed 
of  those  moral  qualities  by  which  he  is  not  only  the  maker  and 
sustainer  of  all  things,  but  their  righteous  Governor  and  their  Judge. 

Now,  such  seem  to  be  the  four  sources  from  which  the  human 
mind  derives  its  idea  of  the  Divine  Being.*  Viewed  separately, 

*  We  purposely  avoid,  at  this  stage,  the  consideration  of  the  scriptural  knowledge 
of  God,  which  will  come  in  at  its  proper  place.  The  Scriptures  declare,  that  some 
knowledge  of  God  can  be  derived  from  nature.  Rom.  i.  20. — "  For  the  invisible 
things  of  God  are  clearly  seen,"  <fec. 


SOURCES    OF    OUR    IDEA    OP    GOD.  17 

the  arguments  drawn  from  these  sources  are  not  all  conclusive, 
or  equally  conclusive ;  one  may  be  considered,  perhaps,  merely  as 
suggestive,  and  another  as  confirmatory ;  one  as  a  proof  of  the 
existence  of  God,  and  another  as  an  illustration  of  the  existence 
of  certain  attributes. 

Each  class  of  objects  furnishes  its  quota  of  evidence.  The 
physical  works  of  God  give  indications  of  power  and  skill.  The 
providence  of  God  exhibits  a  governing  and  controlling  energy. 
Our  spiritual  natures  lift  us  to  the  conception  of  a  living,  a  per- 
sonal, and  spiritual  God. 

These  three  classes  of  objects,  (deferring  the  consideration  of 
the  fourth  for  a  little,)  as  bringing  before  us  nature  animate  and 
inanimate,  and  the  relation  between  them,  establishes  the  benev- 
olence as  well  as  the  wisdom  of  God.  The  phenomena  which 
prove  the  existence  of  God,  also  demonstrates  that  he  delights  in 
the  happiness  of  his  creatures.  For  it  is  conceivable  that  the 
world  might  have  been  filled  with  adaptations  as  wonderful  as 
any  of  the  existing  ones,  but  all  of  them  of  a  diametrically  oppo- 
site character.  The  exquisitely  formed  joints  of  the  animal  frame 
might,  in  the  very  delicacy  of  their  organism,  have  communicated 
the  more  exquisite  pain.  The  plants  of  the  earth  might  have 
grown  to  nourish  the  bodies  of  animals  only  as  the  food  spread 
through  the  organs  to  torture  every  member.  The  sunbeams, 
instead  of  gladdening  all  nature,  might  have  struck  every  living 
being  as  with  a  succession  of  spear  points  to  harass  and  annoy. 
How  delightful  to  find  that  every  adaptation  indicating  design 
also  indicates  benevolence,  and  we  have  as  clear  evidence  of  the 
goodness  as  of  the  very  existence  of  God. 

Let  it  be  observed,  too,  that,  proceeding  upon  these  classes  of 
objects,  the  mind,  as  its  general  conceptions  expand,  will  also 
have  its  idea  of  God  expanded.  When  nature  is  viewed  in  a  nar- 
row spirit,  it  may  leave  the  impression  that  there  is  an  unseemly 
warfare,  and  that  there  are  numberless  contradictions  in  the 
universe.  The  flowers  which  spring  up  to-day  are  blighted  on 
the  morrow.  The  product  of  the  sunshine  and  the  dews  is  often 
destroyed  by  the  storms.  The  winds  of  heaven,  and  the  waves 
of  the  ocean,  look  at  times  as  if  they  delighted  in  contending 
with  each  other.  Hence  we  find  the  heathens  placing  a  separate 
God,  with  a  distinctive  character  and  purposes,  over  every  sep- 
arate element.  There  is  the  god  of  the  rivers,  the  god  of  the 
winds,  and  the  god  of  the  ocean,  who  are  all  supposed  to  feel 

2 


18  INTRODUCTION. 

pleasure  in  thwarting  and  opposing  each  other.  The  light  of 
knowledge,  as  it  rises,  dispels  ihese  phantoms,  and  discloses, 
among  apparent  incongruities  ar.d  contentions,  a  unity  of  purpose 
indicating  a  unity  of  being  in  the  Creator  and  Governor  of  all 
things. 

Modern  research  has  served  to  expand  this  conception  by 
pointing  out  the  links — often  invisible  at  the  first  glance — which 
connect  every  one  part  of  God's  works  with  every  other,  and 
thereby  demonstrates  that  all  nature  has  been  fabricated  by  one 
hand,  and  is  governed  by  one  Lord.  The  same  Being  who  made 
man,  formed,  it  is  evident,  the  animals  which  minister  to  his 
comfort.  Animal  life,  again,  is  dependent  on  vegetable  life,  and 
vegetable  life  is  dependent  on  the  soil  and  atmosphere  ;  and  thus 
the  wide  earth  is  seen  to  be  one  great  whole.  But  terrestrial  ob- 
jects are  also  dependent  on  the  seasons,  and  the  seasons  are  pro- 
duced by  the  relation  between  the  earth  and  the  sun ;  and 
the  great  whole  is  thus  enlarged  so  as  to  include  the  sun.  The 
strength  of  the  animal  muscles  is  suited  to  the  size  of  the  earth  ; 
and  the  continued  existence  of  the  plants  of  the  earth,  and  of 
animal  life,  is  dependent  on  the  length  of  the  day  and  of  the  year, 
and  these  are  occasioned  by  the  laws  and  adjustments  of  the  solar 
system.  The  solar  system,  again,  is  manifestly  connected  in  the 
government  of  God  with  other  systems  ;  for  it  appears  that  our 
sun  is  advancing  nearer  to  certain  stars,  and  movhig  away  from 
others,  and  that  in  obedience  to  laws  which  regulate  other  suns 
and  systems  of  suns.  This  line  of  argument  stretches  out  to  the 
most  distant  parts  of  the  known  universe.  He  who  made  the 
muscle  of  my  limb  made  the  earth  on  which  I  walk,  and  the 
great  luminary  round  which  the  earth  walks,  and  the  grand 
galaxy  in  which  the  sun  moves.  He  who  made  my  eye  made 
the  light  which  comes  to  it ;  and  he  who  made  the  light  made  the 
sun  which  sheds  that  light,  and  the  distant  star,  which  has  taken 
thousands  of  years  to  send  its  beams  across  the  immeasurable 
space  that  intervenes. 

Such  phenomena  help  us  to  comprehend,  so  far  as  finite  crea- 
ture can  comprehend,  the  omnipresence  of  God.  The  human  im- 
agination, bold  and  venturesome  though  it  be,  feels  as  if  it  could 
not  traverse  the  depths  of  space  which  astronomy  discloses.  Its 
wing  becomes  weary  when  it  has  reached  distances  which  light 
requires  many  thousand  years  to  travel  through.  Geology,  again, 
is  Sir  John  Herschell  has  remarked,  does  for  time  what  astronomy 


SOURCES    OF    OUR    IDEA    OP    GOD.  19 

does  for  space,  and  carries  back  the  mind  into  a  past  eternity,  far 
as  it  is  able  and  willing  to  follow. 

And  it  is  not  to  be  overlooked  that,  altogether  independently  of 
such  physical  discoveries,  the  mind,  by  its  own  native  power,  can 
reach  widely  into  the  infinite.  "  Think  of  space,  we  see  it  stretch- 
ing beyond  the  world,  beyond  our  system,  beyond  the  farthest 
limits  of  creation ;  and  every  bound  we  affix  to  it  only  carries"  us 
to  the  unbounded  beyond.  Think  of  time,  all  the  limits  of  dura- 
tion do  but  suggest  the  illimitable  eternity.  Think  of  dependent 
existence,  and  we  sink  lower  and  lower  from  one  stage  of  de- 
pendence to  another,  till  we  rest  only  in  the  independent,  the 
absolute.  Think  of  finite  being,  what  is  it  but  an  endless 
paradox  without  infinite  being?  Think  of  cause,  what  does 
it  end  in  but  the  causa  causarum,  the  spring  and  source  of  all 
things?"* 

"  As  the  idea  of  God  is  removed  farther  from  humanity  and  a 
scattered  polytheism,  it  becomes  more  intense  and  profound  as  it 
becomes  more  universal,  for  the  infinite  is  present  to  everything. 
If  I  fly  into  the  uttermost  parts  of  the  earth  it  is  there ;  also,  if 
we  turn  to  the  east  or  the  west  we  cannot  escape  from  it.  Man 
is  thus  aggrandized  in  the  image  of  his  Maker."t 

Still,  when  we  have  reached  this  point,  and  combined  these 
three  classes  of  phenomena,  the  human  mind  is  not  satisfied,  for 
it  feels  as  if  there  must  be  much  in  the  character  of  God  on  which 
these  objects  can  cast  little  or  no  light.  In  particular,  it  is  anx- 
ious to  know  what  are  his  moral  qualities,  and  the  relation 
morally  subsisting  between  him  and  man.  There  are,  besides, 
doubts  and  perplexities  which  the  mind  must  look  at,  and  which 
it  yet  feels  that  it  cannot  solve.  Why  these  afflictive  dispensa- 
tions of  the  Divine  Providence  !  Why  such  extensive  suffering  ? 
Why  such  a  separation  between  man  and  his  Maker?  The 
mind  feels  as  if  it  must  have  left  some  element  out  of  calculation  ; 
nor  will  it  rest  satisfied  till,  by  the  aid  of  the  moral  law  in  the 
heart,  (being  the  fourth  object,)  it  rises  to  the  contemplation  of  a 
God  who  loves  virtue  and  hates  vice,  and  whose  government  is 
all  order  with  the  view  of  encouraging  the  one  and  discouraging 
the  other,  and  this  by  reason  of  a  perfection  as  essential  to  his 
nature  as  his  omnipresence  or  his  benevolence. 

It  requires  an  observation  of  the  whole  of  these  four  classes  of 

*  Morell's  Modern  Philosophy.    Note.    2d.Edit  t  Hazlitt 


20  INTRODUCTION. 

objects  to  convey  a  full  and  adequate  idea  of  the  Divine  character. 
Leave  out  the  first,  and  we  have  no  elevating  idea  of  the  Divine 
skill  and  intelligence.  Sink  the  second  out  of  sight,  and  the  God 
that  we  acknowledge  cannot  he  distinguished  from  the  universe, 
Leave  out  the  third,  and  he  becomes  a  brute  unconscious  force,  or 
at  best  a  mere  name  for  an  aggregate  of  laws  and  developments. 
Discard  the  fourth  class  of  objects,  and  we  strip  him  of  some 
of  the  very  brightest  rays  of  his -glory,  and  leave  a  physical 
without  a  moral  power,  and  a  weak  beneficence  unguarded  by 
justice. 

When  the  mind  is  fixed  on  any  one  of  these  groups  to  the 
exclusion  of  the  others,  the  conception  becomes  limited,  partial, 
and  so  far  erroneous.  When  it  thinks  only  of  the  physical  works 
of  nature,  it  is  apt  to  conceive  of  thejr  Maker  as  a  mere  mechanical 
power.  When  confined  to  his  providence,  it  regards  nothing  beyond 
his  foresight,  and  sagacity,  and  the  sovereignty  of  his  will.  In 
looking  simply  at  his  spiritual  nature,  his  close  and  intimate  con- 
nection with  his  creatures  is  forgotten.  When  conscience  is  the 
sole  monitor,  he  is  regarded  by  his  sinful  creatures  with  unmin- 
gled  feelings  of  awe  and  fear.  The  mere  physical  inquirer  does 
not  rise  beyond  the  idea  of  skill  and  contrivance.  The  believer 
in  an  exclusive  Providence,  makes  his  Deity  guilty  of  favoritism 
and  caprice.  Those  who  look  solely  to  the  spiritual  nature  of 
God  are  tempted  to  remove  him  into  a  region  of  dreamy  medita- 
tion and  useless  affection.  The  religion  of  conscience  lands  us 
in  superstition  and  will- worship. 

Not  unfrequently  a  few  objects  belonging  to  a  particular  class 
are  fixed  on,  and  the  view  may  become  contracted  to  the  very 
narrowest  point ;  and  God  (as  among  the  CafTres)  may  be  regarded 
as  little  more  than  a  rain  sender,  or  there  may  be  nothing  beyoad 
a  vague  conception,  suggested  by  the  conscience,  of  some  power 
that  is  to  be  feared  because  of  the  evil  which  it  may  inflict. 

The  beautiful  rays  coming  from  the  face  of  God,  and  shining  in 
such  loveliness  around  us,  are  reflected  and  refracted  when  they 
come  in  contact  with  the  human  heart.  Each  Heart  is  apt  to  re- 
ceive only  such  as  please  it,  and  to  reject  the  others.  Hence  the 
many  colored  aspects,  some  of  them  hideous  in  the  extreme,  in 
which  God  is  presented  to  different  nations  and  individuals. 
Hence  the  room  for  each  man  fashioning  a  god  after  his  own 
heart.  An  evil  conscience,  reflecting  only  the  red  rays,  calls  up  a 
god  who  delights  in  blood.  The  man  of  fine  sentiment,  reflect- 


SOURCES    OP    OTJR    IDEA    OF    GOD.  21 

ing  only  the  softer  rays,  paints  from  the  hues  of  his  own  feelings 
a  god  of  mere  sensibility,  tender  as  that  of  the  hero  of  a  modern 
romance.  The  man  of  glowing  imagination  will  array  him  in 
gorgeous  but  delusive  coloring,  and  in  the  flowing  drapery  of 
majesty  and  grandeur,  beneath  which,  however,  there  is  little  or 
no  reality.  The  observer  of  laws  will  represent  him  as  the  em- 
bodiment of  order,  as  blank  and  black  as  the  sun  looks  when  we 
have  gazed  upon  him  till  we  are  no  longer  sensible  of  his  bright- 
ness. It  is  seldom  in  the  apprehensions  of  mankind  that  all  the 
rays  so  meet  as  to  give  us  the  pure  white  light,  and  to  exhibit 
God  in  .all  his  holiness  and  goodness  as  the  fountain  of  lights  in 
whom  is  no  darkness  at  all. 

It  is  a  favorite  maxim  of  a  distinguished  living  philosophy, 
(Cousin,)  that  error  is  always  partial  truth.  That  it  frequently  is 
so  cannot  be  doubted.  But  this  circumstance  should  not  be  used, 
as  Cousin  sometimes  employs  it,  to  excuse  error.  It  ought  at  least 
to  have  been  remarked,  that  partial  truth  is  often  the  most  dan- 
gerous of  all  errors.  Every  one  knows  how  a  garbled  quotation 
may  be  the  most  effectual  perversion  of  an  author's  meaning,  and 
how  a  partial  representation  of  an  incident  in  a  man's  life  may  be 
the  most  malignant  of  all  calumnies.  It  is  in  taking  a  partial 
view  of  truth  that  human  prejudice  finds  the  easiest  and  most  ef- 
fectual method  of  gaining  its  end.  If  men  do  not  wish  to  retain 
God  in  their  knowledge,  they  can  easily  contrive  to  form  a  god  to 
their  own  taste  by  directing  their  eyes  to  certain  objects,  and  shut- 
ting them  to  all  others. 

"  Man,"  says  one  of  the  most  ingenious  and  profound  writers 
of  these  latter  days — we  mean  Yinet, — "  has  never  failed  to  make 
a  God  of  his  own  image,  and  his  various  religious  have  never  sur- 
passed himself;  for,  if  by  these  he  imposes  on  himself  acts  and 
privations  which  he  would  not  otherwise  impose,  those  toils  which 
are  of  his  own  choice  do  not  raise  him  above  himself.  Hence 
those  religions  do  not  change  the  principles  of  his  inner  life : 
they  subject  him  to  an  external  sway  only  to  leave  him  free  at 
heart."  Our  ideas  of  God  thus  originating  in  our  own  hearts  can 
never  be  made  to  rise  higher  than  the  fountain  from  which  they 
have  flowed.  Hence  the  need  of  a  revelation  from  a  higher 
source  to  make  known  a  God,  not  after  the  image  of  man,  but  a 
God  after  whose  image  of  heavenly  descent  man  may  remodel 
his  character,  and  thereby  exalt  it  to  a  heavenly  elevation  and 
brightness. 


22  INTRODUCTION. 

Nor  will  the  progress  of  secular  knowledge  counteract  this  native 
tendency  of  the  human  heart.  It  may  direct  the  stream  in  a  new 
channel,  but  it  cannot  dry  up  the  native  propensities  of  the  heart 
in  which  this  inclination  originates.  The  fundamental  human 
error,  which  assumes  one  form  in  the  ruder  and  uncivilized  ages 
and  nations  of  the  world,  will  take  to  itself  another  shape  in 
those  countries  which  have  made  greater  progress  in  the  arts  and 
sciences.  Polytheism  vanishes  only  that  pantheism  may  take  up 
its  place;  and  the  only  difference  between  them  is,  that  while 
many  errors  lodge  in  the  former,  all  errors  take  refuge  in  the  lat- 
ter. God  ceases  to  be  regarded  with  superstitious  awe ;  but  it  is 
only  that  he  may  be  esteemed  a  mechanical  force,  or  a  philosophic 
abstraction,  or  a  splendid  imagination,  as  gorgeous,  but  as  unsolid, 
too,  as  a  gilded  cloud.  In  the  former  case,  God  did  possess  an  in- 
fluence on  the  character,  at  times  for  good  and  at  times  for  evil  \ 
but  under  these  latter  aspects  he  exercises  no  influence  whatever, 
but  is  a  nonentity  in  power,  as  he  is  conceived  to  be  a  nonentity 
in  reality. 

Of  the  four  sources  from  which  mankind  derive  their  idea  of 
God,  the  first  and  the  third  are  attended  to  with  greater  or  less 
care  by  the  thinking  mind  of  the  present  day.  Hence  we  find 
that,  in  the  common  views  of  the  Divine  Being,  there  are  exalted 
conceptions  of  his  power,  wisdom,  and  goodness,  and  of  his  nature 
as  a  spiritual  intelligence.  It  may  be  doubted,  however,  whether 
the  second  and  fourth  class  of  objects  have  been  so  habitually 
contemplated,  or  whether  they  have  not,  to  some  extent  at  least, 
been  overlooked.  In  some  former  ages  it  might  have  been  more 
needful  to  elevate  the  popular  view  of  the  Divine  intelligence  and 
goodness  and  spirituality,  by  means  of  the  works  of  God  in  the 
physical  and  mental  world.  In  the  present  age  it  may  be  more 
beneficial,  after  the  light  which  has  been  thrown  on  these  topics, 
to  direct  attention  to  the  phenomena  which  speak  of  the  wise  and 
benevolent  and  righteous. Governor.  At  certain  times  and  in  cer- 
tain countries,  the  religion  of  authority  and  the  religion  of  con- 
science have  had  too  extensive  sway ;  but  in  modern  Europe, 
with  the  bonds  of  government  loosened,*  and  the  free  assertion  of 
the  rights  of  man,  there  has  been  a  greater  tendency  to  sink  the 
qualities  of  the  Governor  and  the  Judge.  We  propose  in  this 
Treatise  to  give  the  government  of  God  its  proper  place,  and  bring 
it  out  into  full  and  prominent  relief. 

*  Thiers  says,  that  now  "  kings  reign  but  do  not  govern." 


OBJECT    OF    THIS    TREATISE. 


SECTION  II.-OBJECT  OF  THIS  TREATISE;  INVESTIGATION  OF  THE 
PROVIDENCE  OF  GOD,  AND  THE  CONSCIENCE  OF  MAN,  OR  THE 
EXTERNAL  AND  INTERNAL  GOVERNMENT  OF  GOD. 

There  are  two  important  classes  of  phenomena  to  pass  under 
notice  in  this  Treatise. 

The  first  is  presented  in  the  physical  world  in  its  relation  to 
the  constitution  and  character  of  man,  or  what  we  may  call  the 
providence  of  God. 

The  second  is  presented  in  the  constitution  and  character  of 
man  in  their  relation  to  God,  and  more  particularly  the  moral 
faculty  or  moral  sense.  We  use  this  general  language,  because, 
so  far  as  the  object  at  present  contemplated  is  concerned,  we  do  not 
care  by  what  name  this  moral  quality  of  our  natures  may  be  desig- 
nated ;  whether  it  be  called  the  moral  sense,  or  the  moral  faculty,  or 
the  conscience,  or  the  law  in  the  heart.  By  whatever  name  it  may 
be  distinguished,  this  property  is  certainly  one  of  the  most  won- 
derful in  the  human  constitution.  The  workings  of  conscience  in 
the  soul,  besides  furnishing  a  curious  subject  of  inquiry,  carry  us 
into  the  very  depths  of  our  nature,  and  thence  upwards  to  some 
of  the  highest  perfections  of  God. 

The  external  and  internal  governments  of  God  are  thus  to  pass 
under  review ;  and  truly  we  know  not  how  the  full  character  of 
God  can  be  gathered  from  his  works,  without  a  careful  survey  of 
both  these  departments  of  his  operations. 

A  great  number  of  works,  distinguished  for  learning  and  ability, 
have  been  written  in  our  age,  to  demonstrate  the  existence  of  God, 
and  illustrate  such  perfections  of  his  nature  as  his  power,  his  be- 
nevolence, and  his  wisdom.  But  while  these  treatises  have  es- 
tablished to  the  satisfaction  of  every  mind  capable  of  conviction 
that  a  God  exists,  and  that  he  is  possessed  of  a  certain  class  of  at- 
tributes, the  most  of  them  do  not  exhibit,  and  do  scarcely  profess 
to  exhibit,  to  our  view  the  complete  character.of  God.  Such  works 
as  Paley's  Natural  Theology  and  the  Bridge  water  Essays,  show 
that  we  are  surrounded  by  works  characterized  by  skill,  power, 
and  goodness,  to  which  no  limit  could  be  set.  But  tnese  treatises 
stop  short  at  this  point,  (the  works  of  Dr.  Chalmers  being  always 
exceptions,)  and  leave  us,  amidst  a  huge  mass  of  facts  and  laws, 
with  but  a  very  vague  and  undefined  idea  after  all.  of  the  moral 
and  spiritual  attributes  and  personal  character  of  the  Supreme 
Being. 


24 


INTRODUCTION. 


Now,  in  this  work  we  would  endeavor,  in  all  humility,  to  follow 
out  the  inquiry  which  still  allures  onward  the  mind  which  is  pant- 
ing after  the  knowledge  of  the  truth,  and  asks,  what  is  the  view 
which  these  works  give  of  the  character  of  God  morally  consid- 
ered, and  the  relation  in  which  he  stands  to  his  intelligent  crea- 
tures as  their  Governor  and  their  Judge  ? 

In  the  prosecution  of  this  investigation,  we  must  enter  a  field 
which  has  not  been  traversed  at  all  by  the  ordinary  writers  on 
natural  theology.  In  the  able  works  to  which  reference  has  been 
made,  the  attention  of  the  writers  has  been  very  much  confined 
to  a  few,  and  these,  we  must  take  the  liberty  of  saying,  among 
the  most  limited  of  the  departments  of  the  kingdom  of  God. 
Certain  works  and  laws  of  God  have  been  separately  considered, 
and  a  legitimate  inference  drawn  from  them ;  but  meanwhile 
there  has  been  no  inquiry  into  their  wonderful  combination  and 
grand  results — into  that  ordering  and  marshalling  of  these  works 
and  laws  in  their  reference  to  man,  which  constitute  what  we  call 
the  providence  of  God.  It  is  as  if  a  person,  inspecting  an  inge- 
nious machine,  were  to  look  at  the  separate  wheels  and  cylinders 
and  mechanical  powers  in  operation,  and  yet  pay  no  regard  to  the 
relation  of  these  separate  parts  and  powers  one  to  another,  or  the 
general  result  and  product  of  the  combined  machinery.  Natural 
theologians  have  drawn  the  proper  inference  from  the  particular 
laws  and  nice  adaptations  of  part  to  part  to  which  their  attention 
has  been  called  ;  but  they  have  not  studied  the  general  combina- 
tions, or  the  actual  results  in  the  providence  of  God  ;  and  the  view 
which  they  have  given  of  the  character  of  God  is  contracted,  be- 
cause their  field  of  observation  is  narrow  and  confined.  En- 
larging the  sphere  of  vision,  and  viewing  the  separate  machinery 
as  combined  in  God's  providence,  we  hope  to  rise  to  a  fuller  and 
more  complete  conception  of  the  character  of  God,  than  can  pos- 
sibly be  attained  by  those,  whose  attention  has  been  confined  to 
isolated  fragments  and  particular  laws,  such  as  fall  under  the 
eye  of  the  physical  inquirer,  or  the  theologians  who  use  the  mate- 
rials which  physical  research  has  furnished. 

There  is  nothing  wonderful  in  the  circumstance,  that  the  theo- 
logians of  nature  have  not,  in  their  researches,  seen  the  higher 
moral  qualities  of  God ;  for  they  could  not  expect  to  find  any 
traces  of  them  in  the  territories  which  they  have  visited.  When 
we  wish  to  ascertain  the  moral  character  of  a  fellow-man,  we  look 
to  something  else  than  his  mere  works  of  mechanical  and  intel- 


OBJECT    OP    THIS    TREATISE.  25 

lectual  skill.  These  can  exhibit  nothing  but  those  qualities  from 
which  they  have  sprung — the  ability  of  the  hand  or  of  the  under- 
standing ;  and  when  we  are  bent  on  knowing  his  character,  we 
inquire  into  the  use  which  he  makes  of  his  talents,  and  of  the 
products  and  results  of  them,  and  generally  into  his  conduct 
towards  other  beings — towards  God  and  towards  man.  Our  natu- 
ral theologians  have  acquired  about  as  enlarged  and  accurate  a 
view  of  the  higher  perfections  of  Divjne  Being,  as  they  might 
obtain  of  the  moral  and  religious  character  of  an  architect  by  in- 
specting the  building  which  he  planned ;  or  of  an  artisan,  by 
examining  the  watch  constructed  by  him ;  or  of  a  husbandman, 
by  walking  over  the  field  which  he  had  cultivated.  A  visit  paid 
to  the  workshop  of  an  ingenious  mechanic,  may  bring  under  our 
notice  all  the  qualities  of  the  fine  workman ;  but  meanwhile,  we 
have  no  materials  to  guide  us  in  forming  an  idea  of  his  kindness, 
his  integrity,  his  temperance,  or  his  godliness.  In  order  to  discover 
whether  he  possesses  these  qualities,  we  must  inquire  into  the  use 
which  he  makes  of  the  fruits  of  his  ingenuity ;  we  must  follow  him 
into  the  busy  market  and  the  social  circle,  into  his  family  and  his 
closet.  Now,  if  we  would  discover  the  infinitely  glorious  moral 
perfections  of  the  Supreme  Being,  we  must  in  like  manner  enter 
other  regions  than  those  into  which  the  mere  classifier  of  the 
laws  of  nature  would  conduct  us.  In  investigating  the  laws  of 
inanimate  nature,  we  may  expect  to  find,  and  do  find,  innumerable 
traces  of  lofty  intelligence ;  in  examining  the  different  parts  of  the 
animal  frame,  we  may  hope  to  find  marks,  and  we  discover  them 
in  abundance,  of  that  benevolence  which  makes  the  possessor  de- 
light in  the  happiness  of  sentient  being ;  but  if  we  would  discover 
the  justice  and  holiness  of  God,  and  the  qualities  which  distinguish 
the  righteous  and  benevolent  governor,  we  must  look  to  the  bear- 
ing of  his  works  and  dispensations  on  the  state  and  character  of 
man.  It  is  by  the  help  of  these  wonders  of  God's  providence  that 
we  must  seek  to  rise  to  the  contemplation  of,  and  belief  in,  the 
higher  wonders  of  his  character.  "For  in  this  mass  of  nature," 
says  Sir  Thomas  Brown,  "there  is  a  set  of  things  that  carry  in 
their  front,  though  not  in  capital  letters,  yet  in  stenography  and 
short-hand  characters,  something  of  divinity,  which  to  wiser 
reasons  serve  as  luminaries  in  the  abyss  of  knowledge,  and  to 
judicious  beliefs  as  scales  and  roundles  to  mount  the  pinnacles 
and  highest  pieces  of  divinity."  *  It  is  our  object  in  this  work  to 

*  Religio  Medici,  sect.  *il 


26 


INTRODUCTION. 


develop  such  a  "  set  of  things,"  for  the  purpose  at  once  of  guiding 
the  intellect,  and  exalting  the  faith  towards  the  highest  per- 
fections of  the  divine  character,  so  far  as  they  can  be  discovered 
by  the  somewhat  dim  and  flickering  light  which  nature  furnishes. 

In  conducting  this  inquiry,  we  shall  find  ourselves  in  the  midst 
of  a  topic  of  most  momentous  import,  but  from  which  modern 
scientific  men  have  generally  drawn  back,  as  if  they  felt  unable 
or  unwilling  to  grapple  with  it,  because  too  high  for  their  under- 
standing to  reach  it,  or  too  humbling  to  their  pride  to  stoop  down 
to  it.  The  subject  referred  to  is  the  relation  in  which  God 
stands  towards  man.  Our  literati  and  secular  philosophers 
are  in  general  willing  to  acknowledge  that  a  God  exists;  but 
they  have  very  confused  and  ill-assorted  ideas  as  to  the  rela- 
tion in  which  he  stands  towards  the.  human  race.  Yet  surely  this 
latter  subject  is  not  inferior  in  philosophical  interest,  or  practical 
importance,  to  the  other,  or  indeed  to  any  other.  The  character 
of  God  cannot  well  be  understood  by  us  till  we  consider  it  in  its 
relation  to  man.  How  do  I  stand  in  reference  to  that  Being,  of 
whose  greatness  and  goodness  I  profess  to  entertain  such  lofty 
ideas  ?  How  does  he  stand  affected  towards  me  ?  We  know  not 
if  the  settlement  of  the  question  of  the  existence  of  God  be  to  us 
of  greater  moment  than  the  settlement  of  this  other  question, 
What  is  the  relation  in  which  we  stand  to  Him  ?  This  is  certain, 
that  the  settlement  of  the  one  question  should  instantly  lead  to 
the  settlement  of  the  other;  and  the  inquirer  has  stopped  half- 
way, and  has  acquired  little  that  is  truly  valuable,  till  he  pursues 
his  researches  into  this  second  field  which  lies  contiguous  to  the 
other. 

This  second  inquiry  must  bring  under  our  special  notice  and 
consideration  the  character  of  man,  not,  it  is  true,  metaphysically 
or  analytically,  or  in  all  its  aspects,  but  in  its  bearings  towards 
God.  The  consideration  of  the  nature  of  man,  and  more  par- 
ticularly of  his  moral  qualities,  will  again  conduct  us  upward  to 
the  contemplation  of  the  rectitude  or  the  moral  excellence  of  God. 
It  is  by  placing  the  two  together,  the  character  of  God  and  the 
character  of  man  as  it  were  in  juxtaposition,  the  one  over  against 
the  other,  that  we  can  best  understand  both.  This  relation  of 
God  and  man,  the  one  towards  the  other,  is  the  department  of 
Divine  and  human  knowledge  in  which,  in  our  humble  opinion, 
this  generation  has  most  need  to  be  instructed. 

We  live  in  an  age  which  boasts  of  its  light  and  knowledge ; 


OBJECT    OF    THIS    TREATISE.  27 

but  it  may  be  doubted  how  far  those  who  are  most  disposed  to  be 
vain-glorious  have,  after  all,  very  deep  or  comprehensive  views  of 
the  character  of  the  Deity.  We  laugh  at  the  narrow  and  super- 
stitious views  entertained  of  God  by  savage  nations,  and  in  th@ 
darker  ages  of  the  history  of  the  world  ;  but  perhaps  we  might 
be  as  profitably  employed  in  inquiring  whether  we  have  ourselves 
attained  to  ideas  that  are  correct  and  adequate. 

In  this,  or  indeed  in  any  age,  there  are  comparatively  few  dis- 
posed to  deny  absolutely  the  existence  of  a  superior  or  a  supreme 
Being.  We  would  not  say  that  the  idea  of,  and  belief  in,  the  ex- 
istence of  God  are  innate  in,  or  connate  with,  the  human  soul ; 
but  they  are  the  natural  result  of  the  exercise  of  the  human 
faculties  and  intuitions  in  the  circumstances  in  which  man  is 
placed.  Degraded  though  man  be,  he  shrinks  from  Atheism  with 
almost  as  strong  an  aversion  as  he  does  from  annihilation.  Man- 
kind cannot  be  brought  to  believe,  that  there  are  not  traces  in  the 
world  of  something  higher  than  blind  fate  and  the  freaks  of  chance. 
Their  felt  weakness,  their  very  pride,  cannot  brook  the  thought 
of  there  being  no  presiding  power  to  overlook  their  destiny.  There 
are,  besides,  certain  periods  of  helplessness  in  every  man's  life, 
when  the  soothing  accents  of  human  affection  cannot  be  found, 
or  what  is  worse,  can  afford  no  comfort;  and  then  the  heart, 
whatever  may  be  the  sophistries  in  which  the  reason  is  warped, 
will  insist  on  believing  that  there  is  a  God  who  sympathizes  with 
us  and  pities  us.  Rather  than  abandon  the  thought  that  some 
Being  above  nature  was  interested  in  them,  mankind  will  assume 
that  the  heavenly  bodies  have  some  mysterious  communication 
with  the  earth ;  that  the  sun  goes  round  the  whole  globe  just  to 
see  their  actions :  that  there  are  planets  presiding  over  our  birth, 
and  determining  our  life  and  death ;  or  they  will  people  the  woods 
and  the  darkness  of  night  with  spirits,  and  reckon  the  breezes 
their  whispers  of  communication  regarding  us,  and  the  storms  the 
expression  of  their  indignation  against  those  who  have  offended 
them.  If  forever  without  a  companion,  man  would  sometimes 
prefer  an  unpleasant  one ;  and  on  a  like  principle,  he  would  wor- 
ship a  god  supposed  to  be  possessed  of  many  hideous  qualities, 
rather  than  be  driven  to  regard  this  universe  as  a  blank  and  unin- 
habited void. 

But  while  man  is  naturally  led  to  believe  in  God,  he  is  not  led 
so  naturally  to  entertain  just  and  spiritual  conceptions  of  his 
character.  If  it  is  a  fact  that  almost  all  nations  have  retained 


28  INTRODUCTION. 

some  idea  of  a  God,  it  is  also  a  fact,  explain  it  as  we  please,  that 
all  nations  have  fallen  into  the  most  unworthy  conceptions  of  his 
nature  and  connection  with  the  human  race.  We  believe  the 
second  of  these  facts  to  be  the  natural  result  of  man's  character 
as  much  as  the  other.  False  religions,  appearing  in  every  age 
and  nation,  have  assumed  forms  as  varied  as  the  tastes  and  preju- 
dices, as  the  habits  and  manners  of  mankind,  or  as  the  climates 
in  which  they  lived,  but  all  tending  to  darken  and  degrade  the 
purity  of  the  Divine  nature. 

Man  must  have  a  god  ;  but  he  forms  his  own  god,  and  he 
makes  it  a  god  after  his  own  image.  Instead  of  forming  his 
own  character  after  the  likeness  of  God,  he  would  fashion  a  god 
after  his  own  likeness.  It  appears  that  at  a  very  early  age  in  the 
history  of  the  world,  there  was  a  tendency  to  carnalize  the  Divine 
character  by  representing  it  in  symbol,  in  brute  symbol,  as  among 
the  ancient  Egyptians ;  in  the  more  glorious  of  the  inanimate 
works  of  God,  as  among  the  Persians  ;  and  in  images  of  man's 
o\vn  construction,  as  among  the  majority  of  nations.  The  very 
Beauty  of  the  works  of  God  stole  away  men's  minds  from  the 
author,  and  they  lifted  up  an  eye,  first  of  reverence  and  then  of 
worship  to  the  sun  and  moon  and  host  of  heaven,  considered  by 
the  philosophers  as  emanations  of  Deity,  and  by  the  multitude  as 
the  Deities  themselves.  Others  were  more  impressed  with  the 
heroic  and  the  ancient,  and  deified  the  heroes  of  bygone  ages,  the 
renowned  warriors  of  their  country,  the  promoters  of  the  arts  and 
sciences.  So  strong  was  this  desire  to  bring  down  celestial  things 
to  the  level  of  terrestrial  things,  that  in  the  Egyptian  mythology 
heaven  was  merely  a  celestial  Egypt,  watered  by  a  celestial  Nile, 
lightened  by  a  celestial  sun,  and  divided  into  the  same  number 
of  gnomes  as  the  earthly  country,  and  each  of  these  the  peculiar 
residence  of  the  God  worshipped  in  the  corresponding  district  of 
the  terrestrial  Egypt.  Error  as  it  advanced  grew  in  wayward- 
ness and  strength,  till,  in  the  ages  of  Homer  and  Hesiod,  the 
prevailing  religions  of  Europe  have  become  completely  anthro- 
pomorphic, and  Mars  is  just  the  embodiment  of  the  popular 
admiration  of  warlike  achievement,  and  Venus  that  of  the  popular 
conception  of  love.  So  complete  at  length  does  this  adaptation 
to  human  nature  become,  that  thieves  have  had  their  patron  god 
in  Mercury,  and  the  Thugs  had  divinities  who  were  pleased 
with  the  murders  which  they  committed. 

The   Greek  philosopher  Xenophanes,   ridiculing  this   anthro- 


OBJECT    OP    THIS    TREATISE.  29 

pomorphic  spirit,  was  in  the  way  of  satirically  referring  to  the 
Ethiopians,  who  represented  their  gods  with  flat  noses,  and  of 
a  black  color,  and  to  the  Thracians,  who  gave  them  blue  eyes 
and  ruddy  complexions.  It  may  be  doubted,  however,  whether 
the  philosophers  themselves  rose  above  this  natural  tendency. 
The  Stoic  divinities  are  just  a  personification  of  the  stern  method 
of  the  Stoic  character ;  and  the  idle  pleasure-loving  gods  of  the 
Epicureans,  are  the  expression  of  the  tastes  and  desires  of  the 
votaries  of  that  philosophy. 

In  ancient  Judea,  and  in  certain  modern  nations,  the  people 
have  been  kept  from  falling  into  such  errors,  by  what  professes 
to  be  a  revelation  from  heaven.  What  philosophy  never  could 
have  effected,  so  far  as  the  great  mass  of  the  people  is  concerned, 
has  been  accomplished  by  what  appeared  to  the  subtle  Greek  as 
foolishness.  In  our  own  country,  the  light  of  heaven  has  been 
let  in  upon  the  dark  groves  where  our  forefathers  offered  human 
sacrifices,  and  all  ghostly  terrors  have  vanished  before  it.  But 
error  has  not  always  disappeared  when  it  has  changed  its  forms. 
While  the  old  body  remains,  it  can  suit  its  dress  to  the  fashion  of 
the  time  and  place.  Our  hearts  would  now  revolt  at  the  very 
idea  of  bowing  the  knee  to  an  idol,  chiselled  by  Phidias  himself. 
With  minds  enlarged  by  extended  knowledge,  we  choose  rather  to 
exalt  the  character  of  God  ;  for  the  more  elevated  he  is,  our  pride 
is  the  less  offended  by  being  obliged  to  pay  him  honor.  But 
while  the  popular  conception  of  his  character  never  omits  these 
his  physical  attributes  of  power,  omnipresence,  and  eternity,  it  is 
a  question  worthy  of  being  put  and  answered,  whether  it  has  not 
been  leaving  out  other  qualities  equally  essential  to  his  nature, 
such  as  holiness,  righteousness,  and  grace,  that  is,  undeserved 
mercy  bestowed  in  consistency  with  justice.  We  fear  that  there 
is  something  repulsive  to  many  in  these  phrases ;  no  not  in  the 
phrases  themselves,  (whatever  John  Foster  may  say  to  the  con- 
trary, when  he  speaks  of  the  offensiveness  of  evangelical  language 
to  literary  men,)  but  in  the  very  ideas  which  these  words  embody, 
and  which  cannot  be  expressed  in  all  their  depth  of  meaning  by 
any  others.  While  man  wishes  to  believe  that  there  is  a  God,  he 
does  not  feel  any  delight  in  contemplating  a  being  of  infinite 
purity ;  and  the  mind  turns  away  from  the  view  as  the  eye  does 
from  the  full  splendor  of  the  noonday  sun.  It  thus  happens,  that 
while  men  do  wish  to  believe  that  there  is  a  God,  they  do  not  wish 
to  believe  in  the  living  and  the  true  God.  They  love  to  dwell 


30  INTRODUCTION. 

on  an  existing  God,  but  they  do  not  love  the  contemplation  of  the 
actually  existing  God.  Driven  by  these  opposing  impulses— now 
by  the  one  and  now  by  the  other — the  religious  history  of  the 
world  is  a  very  vacillating,  as  well  as  a  very  melancholy  one. 
Man  is  ever  fondly  clinging  to  the  idea  of  a  God ;  and  ever  en- 
deavoring, at  the  same  time,  to  bring  that  idea  into  accordance 
with  his  own  wishes,  and  narrow  interests  and  character.  The 
'  religious  history  of  mankind  maybe  summed  up  in  this — that  it 
is  a  continually  repeated  attempt  to  suit  the  character  of  God  to 
those  who  feel  that  they  cannot  do  without  him. 

It  is  worthy  of  being  inquired,  whether  this  strong  tendency  of 
our  nature  may  not  be  at  work  in  this  present  age,  as  it  has  been 
operating  in  all  past  ages ;  and  whether  our  literary  and  scien- 
tific men  are  not  holding  forth  to  themselves  and  to  the  popular 
view  the  Divine  Being  shorn  of  some  of  the  brightest  of  his  per- 
fections, because  too  dazzling  to  their  eyes :  whether  the  God 
adored  by  some  be  not  as  different  from  the  truly  existing  God, 
as  the  gods  of  the  heathens  were :  be  not,  in  short,  the  creature 
of  men's  imagination,  just  as  truly  as  the  images  worshipped  in 
idolatrous  nations  are  the  workmanship  of  men's  hands. 

Taking  a  wider  range  than  the  writers  on  natural  theology  are 
wont  to  do,  and  embracing  within  our  view  a  larger  field,  we  hope 
to  rise,  by  means  of  the  very  works  of  God.  to  a  grander  and  more 
elevated  conception  of  the  Divine  character  than  those  have 
attained  who  look  to  mere  physical  facts  and  laws.  Nor  will  we 
disguise,  from  the  very  commencement  of  this  Treatise,  that 
we  expect  to  establish,  by  a  large  induction,  that  the  views  given 
by  the  works  of  God  of  the  character  of  their  maker  and  gov- 
ernor, do  most'  thoroughly  harmonize  with  the  doctrines  con- 
tained in  that  book,  which  professes  to  be  a  revelation  of  God's 
will  to  man. 

On  rising  from  the  common  treatises  which  have  been  written 
on  the  subject  of  natural  theology  and  ethical  philosophy,  every 
intelligent  reader  has  felt  as  if  the  view  there  given  of  the  Deity 
was  different  from  what  is  disclosed  in  that  book  which  claims  to 
be  the  word  of  God  ;  in  short,  as  if  the  jGod  of  natural  -was  differ- 
ent from  the  God  of  revealed  religion.  Persons  who  take  their 
views  of  God  from  mere  scientific  treatises  and  the  current  litera- 
ture, are  apt  to  feel  as  if  the  God  of  the  Bible  was  too  stern  and 
gloomy.  An  acute  thinker  of  the  present  day  speaks  of  "  the  dark 


OBJECT    OF    THIS    TREATISE.  31 

shadow  of  the  Hebrew  God,"*  and  the  phrase  is  significant  of  the 
feelings  cherished  by  multitudes  who  breathe  and  live  in  the 
lighter  literature  of  the  age.  On  the  other  hand,  persons  who 
adopt  their  ideas  of  God's  character  from  the  volume  of  inspira- 
tion, are  apt  to  regard  the  representations  of  Deity  in  works  of 
natural  theology  as  meagre  and  unsatisfactory  in  the  extreme. 
All  who  have  sipped  of  our  current  literature,  or  drunk  into  our 
science,  and  then  turned  to  the  Bible,  have  felt  this  discrepancy, 
though  they  may  not  be  able  to  state  wherein  it  consists.  That 
felt  difference  cannot  be  expressed  so  fully,  we  think,  as  by  one 
word  frequently  employed  in  Scripture,  but  carefully  banished 
from  the  phraseology  of  scientific  theology ;  that  word  is  holi- 
ness— a  phrase  denoting  one  of  the  most  essential  of  the  Divine 
attributes,  but  to  which  no  reference  is  made  by  the  common 
writers  on  natural  religion.  Nor  is  it  to  be  expected  that  there 
should ;  for  independently  of  the  circumstance  that  men  are 
tempted  to  turn  away  from  the  too  great  purity  of  such  a  perfec- 
tion, there  is  truly  nothing  in  the  objects  which  they  habitually 
contemplate  to  call  their  attention  to  it.  After  they  have  inspected, 
with  the  utmost  minuteness  and  accuracy,  the  structure  and 
organization  of  plants,  and  the  joints  an,d  instincts  of  animals, 
and  the  laws  of  the  planets  and  fixed  stars,  they  are  as  far  as  be- 
fore from  everything  relating  to  the  moral  law  of  God,  or  which 
might  lead  them  to  discover  how  God  acts  towards  those  who 
have  broken  that  law.  If  the  properties  of  the  Divine  nature  re- 
ferred to  are  to  be  found  anywhere  in  the  works  of  God,  they  are 
to  be  discovered,  it  is  manifest,  in  the  dealings  and  dispensations 
of  God  towards  the  human  race,  and  in  the  moral  law  which  he 
hath  inscribed  on  every  human  breast. 

If  these  views  be  substantiated  by  the  considerations  to  be  ad- 
duced, there  will  thereby  be  furnished  a  link  to  connect  the  works 
with  the  word  of  God,  and  natural  with  revealed  religion ;  there 
will  be  a  bridge  to  join  two  territories,  which  have  been  separated 
by  a  wide  chasm.  If  it  be  true  that  the  government  of  God, 
rightly  interpreted,  gives  the  same  view  of  the  character  of  God, 
and  the  relation  in  which  he  stands  to  man,  as  the  New  Testa- 
ment, then  we  have  a  strong  and  very  satisfactory  evidence  in 
favor  of  the  Divine  origin  of  the  Scriptures,  and  the  religion  em- 
bodied in  them.  The  events  of  history,  and  the  observations 
ef  travellers,  and  the  testimony  of  unimpeachable  witnesses, 

*  Sir  Edward  L.  Bulwer. 


32  INTRODUCTION. 

have  all  been  made  to  yield  their  quota  of  evidence  in  behalf  of 
the  truth  of  Christianity.  We  are  now  to  inquire,  if  some  im- 
portant corroborative  proof  may  not  be  supplied,  by  the  method 
of  the  Divine  government  in  the  world  without  and  the  world 
within  us. 

We  are  to  be  engaged  in  reading,  it  must  be  acknowledged,  the 
half-effaced  writing  on  columns  sadly  broken  and  disjointed,  show- 
ing but  the  ruins  of  their  former  grajideur ;  nevertheless  with  care, 
we  trust  to  be  able  to  decipher  sufficient  to  show  that  the  writing 
is  of  the  same  import  as  that  brighter  and  clearer  revelation  which 
God  has  given  of  himself  in  the  volume  of  His  word ;  and  from 
their  sameness,  to  demonstrate  that  both  have  been  written  by  the 
same  unerring  hand. 


CHAPTER  1 1. 

GENERAL  ASPECT  OF  THE  DIVINE  GOVERNMENT;  PHENOMENA 
PRESENTED  BY  THE   PROVIDENCE  OF  GOD,  AND   THE 
SCIENCE  OF  MAN,  THOUGH  COMMONLY  OVERLOOKED. 

SECTION  I— INSTRUCTIVE  VIEWS  OF  GOD  PRESENTED  BY  HIS 
GOVERNMENT. 

AN  inhabitant  of  a  distant  part  of  our  world  or  of  another 
world,  let  us  suppose,  visits  Europe,  and  inspects  some  of  our 
finer  cathedrals,  such  as  that  of  York  or  Cologne.  Admiring  the 
buildings,  he  is  led  to  inquire  narrowly  into  their  architecture,  and 
he  observes  how  stone  is  fitted  to  stone,  and  buttress  to  that  which, 
it  supports,  and  how  all  the  parts  are  in  beautiful  adaptation  one 
to  another.  Does  he  know  all  about  these  cathedrals,  when  he 
has  completed  this  class  of  observations  ?  In  one  sense,  he  know& 
everything ;  he  knows  that  the  building  material  of  the  one  is  a 
species  of  limestone,  and  of  the  other,  basalt ;  every  stone  and 
pillar  and  window  has  been  examined  by  him,  and  he  has  ad- 
mired the  beautiful  proportions  of  the  whole  fabric.  But  if  he  has 
gone  no  farther  in  his  inquiries,  he  has  but  a  meagre  idea  after 
all  pf  these  temples.  There  are  higher  questions,  What  is  the 
use  of  this  chapter-house?  of  this  crypt?  of  this  lovely  chapel  or 
chancel  ?  The  stranger  has  no  proper  idea  of  the  cathedrals,  till 
rising  beyond  the  minute  inspection  of  stones,  and  columns,  and 
aisles,  he  contemplates  the  grand  results  and  uses,  and  observes, 
how  this  part  was  for  the  burial  of  the  distinguished  dead — this 
other  part  for  the  kneeling  of  the  worshippers — this  third  part  for 
the  convocation  of  the  priests — this  fourth  part  for  the  dispensa- 
tion of  the  holiest  rite  of  the  Christian  Church — and  the  whole 
for  the  worship  of  God. 

Now,  we  hold  that  the  investigator  of  the  mere  facts  and  laws 
of  nature  is  engaged  in  a  work  resembling  that  of  this  supposed 
visitant,  when  he  is  examining  the  stones  and  arches  of  the  build- 
ing. We  are  not  inclined  to  depreciate  this  work  of  the  scientific 

3 


34  INSTRUCTIVE    VIEWS    OF    GOD 

inquirer ;  and  \ve  are  not  doing  so  when  we  maintain,  that  if  he 
would  rise  to  a  correct  view  of  the  character  of  God,  he  must  en- 
large the  sphere  of  his  vision  ;  his  eye  and  his  mind  must  take  in 
other  phenomena,  and  he  must  look  at  the  object  served  by  this 
temple  (for  such  it  is)  whose  architecture  he  has  been  observing 
and  admiring. 

In  investigating  these  two  topics,  the  providence  of  God  and  the 
moral  principles  of  man's  nature, .we  trust  to  rise  above  the  inad- 
equate conceptions  of  the  Divine  character  which  are  so  com- 
monly entertained  in  the  present  age.  By  their  means,  we  shall 
ascend  beyond  mere  mechanism  to  life,  beyond  mere  laws  to  a 
lawgiver,  and  beyond  even  legislation  to  an  active  and  orderly 
government,  with  its  judicial  and  executive  departments.  Instead 
of  an  image  of  marble  set  up  on  a  pedestal  by  the  hands  of  man 
to  be  admired,  we  shall  contemplate  a  living  and  reigning  king 
seated  upon  a  throne,  and  wielding  authority  over,  and  issuing 
commands  to,  all  his  creatures. 

The  inquiry  will  present  to  us  numberless  proofs  of  a  universal 
and  reigning  wisdom  and  benevolence.  When  we  enter  this  coun- 
cil chamber  of  the  Lord  of  the  universe,  we  shall  find  clearer  evi- 
dence of  a  distinct  affection  of  love  reigning  in  his  bosom  than 
can  possibly  be  discovered  in  the  mere  outworks  of  nature ;  and 
such  are  those  adaptations  of  inanimate  nature,  and  of  the  func- 
tions and  limbs  of  animals  which  are  brought  under  our  notice  in 
the  common  books  on  natural  theology.  With  phenomena  before 
us,  exhibiting  the  working  of  the  very  heart  of  God,  and  not,  if 
we  may  so  speak,  the  movements  of  his  mere  members,  we  are 
enabled  to  go  beyond  a  mere  principle  or  law  of  beneficence  at 
which  so  many  stop  at  the  present  day,  and  ascend  to  a  warm 
and  living  affection.  We  rise  beyond  law  to  life,  and  beyond  life 
to  love. 

Not  only  so,  but  mounting  still  higher,  we  pass  beyond  even 
love,  and  reach  a  moral  principle,  or  rather  a  moral  purpose  and 
affection  in  judging  of  human  character,  we  distinguish  between 
the  man  of  mere  tenderness  of  nerve  and  sensibility  and  the  man 
of  virtue ;  and  we  may  in  like  manner  distinguish  between  the 
mere  beneficence  of  God  and  the  higher  quality  of  holiness  or 
righteousness.  It  is  specially  in  the  government  of  God  that  we 
are  to  discover  the  traces  of  this  latter  perfection  of  his  character. 

Natural  theology  is  the  science  which,  from  an  investigation  of 
the  works  of  God,  would  rise  to  a  discovery  of  the  character  and 


PRESENTED   BY   HIS    GOVERNMENT.  35 

will  of  God,  and  of  the  relation  in  which  man  stands  to  him.  In 
this  science,  the  inquirer  proceeds,  or  should  proceed,  exactly  as 
he  does  in  every  other  branch  of  human  investigation.  He  sets 
out  in  search  of  facts ;  he  arranges  and  classifies  them ;  and 
rising  from  the  phenomena  which  present  themselves  to  their 
cause,  he  discovers  a  cause  of  all  subordinate  causes.  Lord 
Brougham  has  shown  that  natural  theology  may  be  made  a  sci- 
ence, the  truths  of  which  are  discovered  by  induction  like  the 
truths  of  physical  science.  But  in  prosecuting  such  a  method,  it 
is  absolutely  necessary  that  we  do  not  overlook  any  of  the  more 
important  facts.  An  omission  of  an  essential  circumstance  in  the 
premises,  will  lead  to  a  mighty  defect  in  the  result.  Pursuing 
this  method  in  this  treatise,  we  shall  bring  into  notice  certain 
phenomena,  which  writers  of  the  school  of  Lord  Brougham  have 
intentionally  or  unintentionally  overlooked,  though  they  stand 
out  in  as  marked  a  manner  as  any  that  have  been  investigated 
by  them. 

Mathematicians,  in  solving  a  difficult  problem  capable  of  solu- 
tion, find  that  all  their  attempts  turn  out  to  be  vain,  and  their 
calculations  only  land  them  in  additional  perplexity,  when  they 
have  overlooked  some  important  element.  It  is  from  a  like  cause, 
we  believe,  that  those  who  take  their  views  of  the  character  of 
God,  and  of  the  relation  in  which  he  stands  to  the  world  from  the 
common  treatises  on  natural  theology,  are  ever  finding  riddles  in 
the  works  of  God  which  it  is  impossible  to  solve.  Everything 
will  appear  as  complex  to  them  as  the  heavens  did  to  astrono- 
mers when  the  earth  was  supposed  to  be  the  centre  of  the  uni- 
verse, and  the  stars  were  reckoned  to  run  in  cycles  and  epicycles; 
or  as  the  fossil  remains  of  the  earth  to  geologists,  when  it  was  as- 
sumed that  the  world  was  created  as  it  is  some  six  thousand  years 
ago.  The  theory  of  gravitation,  and  of  successive  changes  on 
the  earth's  surface,  at  once  brought  all  the  phenomena  which  had 
before  puzzled  the  inquirer  into  harmony,  just  as  the  sun  in  the 
centre  gives  a  unity  to  the  whole  system.  Has  God  furnished  no 
clue  to  guide  us  through  the  labyrinth  in  which  human  intelligence 
finds  itself,  when,  setting  out  from  the  ordinary  starting-point,  it 
would  penetrate  the  providence  of  God  ?  Or  rather,  starting  from 
another  point,  may  not  the  seeming  labyrinth  turn  out  to  be  a 
complex,  but  not  a  complicated  or  confused  dwelling,  and  all  its 
parts  in  orderly  proportion  ? 

This  world  is  not  in  the  state  in  which  the  intelligent  and  be- 


36  INSTRUCTIVE    VIEWS    OF    GOI> 

nevolent  mind  would  have  expected  it  to  be  a  priori.  Let  tne 
problem  be:  given  a  God  of  infinite  power  and  wisdom  to  deter- 
mine the  character  of  the  world  which  he  would  fashion,  and 
man's  solution  would  present  a  very  different  world  from  the 
actual  one.  True,  the  problem  is  confessedly  of  too  high  an 
order  for  human  intellect  to  solve  it  correctly  ;  but  every  approxi- 
mation which  he  makes,  only  impresses  him  the  more  with  won- 
der, awe,  and  fear,  when  he  compares  the  results  at  which  he 
arrives  with  the  actual  results,  as  we  must  believe  them,  of  heav- 
enly intelligence  and  love,  in  the  existing  world  in  which  we  are 
placed. 

We  maintain  that  the  solution  of  this  mystery  is  to  be  found, 
so  far  as  it  can  be  found,  in  the  careful  consideration  of  the 
departments  of  God's  works  in  which  the  mystery  appears.  The 
mystery,  as  existing  in  the  government  of  God,  demands  a  more 
earnest  investigation  of  that  government ;  and  underneath  the 
very  folds  of  the  mystery,  we  may  discover  the  truths  which  con- 
duct to  a  right  explanation. 

"  They  that  deny  the  depravity  of  human  nature  are  involved 
in  perplexity,  and  speak  of  the  subject  of  the  Divine  government 
with  such  doubt,  confusion,  and  embarrassment,  as  increase  scep- 
ticism in  themselves,  while  they  too  often  produce  it  in  their  ad- 
mirers." Robert  Hall,  in  this  language,  refers  only  to  one  of  sev- 
eral kindred  phenomena,  which  must  be  taken  into  account  in 
order  to  a  comprehension  of  the  government  of  God. 

There  are  five  phenomena,  or  rather  classes  of  phenomena, 
which  must  be  contemplated  by  ail  who  would  comprehend  the 
state  of  this  world  in  its  relation  to  God.  Two  of  these  are  pre- 
sented, at  least  more  especially  by  the  providence  of  God,  and 
other  two  by  the  human  soul,  and  more  particularly  by  its  moral 
qualities,  and  an  intermediate  one  by  the  combined  view  of  both. 

I.  The  providence  of  God  presents  us  \  1-  Extensive  suffering,  bodily  and  mental, 
with —  J  2.  Restraints  and  penalties  laid  on  man. 

IL  The  soul  of  man  in  its  relation  to  (    *  8"  God  at  a  distance  from  man" 

God  shows  us }       4-  Man  at  a  distance  from  God. 

(       5.  A  schism  in  the  human  souls. 

We  are  aware  that,  in  bringing  these  classes  of  objects  under 
notice,  especially  at  so  early  a  stage  of  our  inquiry,  we  run  the 
risk  of  giving  our  work  a  repulsive  aspect  in  the  eyes  of  many. 
It  may  seem  as  if  we  were  delineating  our  God,  with  the  grim 


SUFFERING,    BODILY    AND    MENTAL.  37 

and  sombre  visage  which  settles  on  the  face  of  many  of  the  hea- 
ihen  idols.  Should  this  impression  be  unfortunately  produced 
on  the  minds  of  any,  we  trust  that  it  will  vanish  long  before  our 
hiquiries  are  brought  to  a  close.  If  we  seem,  to  an  age  distin- 
guished for  the  lightness  of  its  literature,  (this  age  of  literary  dis- 
sipation, demanding  stronger  and  yet  stronger  stimulants,)  to  act 
like  the  ancient  Egyptians  when  they  brought  coffins  into  their 
feasts,  we  claim  at  least  to  be  actuated  by  the  same  motives  ;  it 
is  for  the  purposes  of  solemn  instruction  to  a  generation  which 
needs  to  be  instructed,  (though  it  demands  rather  to  be  enter- 
tained •)  and  while  we  produce  the  stern  memorials  of  man's 
weakness,  we  also  proffer  the  food  which,  in  our  view,  is  fitted  to 
remove  it.  If  we  are  constrained  at  some  parts  of  our  treatise  to 
give  a  prominence  to  certain  darker  phenomena,  it  is  because  oth- 
ers have  left  them  out  of  sight ;  and  with  our  exhibition  of  the 
graver  and  more  commanding  and  authoritative  features  of  the 
Divine  countenance,  we  shall  show  a  smile  of  love  ever  playing 
upon  it,  and  encouraging  the  heart  of  the  most  timid  to  approach. 

SECTION  II.— THE  EXISTENCE  OF  EXTENSIVE  SUFFERING,  BODILY 

AND  MENTAL. 

In  these  sections  our  object  is  to  state  the  facts,  and  point  out 
the  unsatisfactory  nature  of  the  common  explanations,  rather  than 
ourselves  to  offer  any  positive  solution.  It  is  from  a  combined 
view  of  the  whole,  at  a  future  stage  of  our  inquiries,  that  the  cor- 
rect conclusion  must  be  derived. 

It  will  not  be  denied  that  there  is  pain,  and  pain  to  an  extraor- 
dinary extent,  in  the  world.  It  is  not  the  mere  circumstance  that 
there  is  suffering  that  is  so  wonderful,  but  the  circumstance  that 
suffering  is  so  great  and  wide-spread.  Why  is  there  pain  in  the 
world  at  all?  This  is  a  difficult  question  to  answer ;  but  perhaps 
mot  so  difficult  as  this  other,  Why  does  it  exist  to  such  an  extent? 
Could  not  God  have  created  a  world  in  which  there  was  no  pain 
to  tear  the  bodily  frame,  and  no  grief  to  cloud  and  shadow  the 
soul?  Or  suppose  that  we  are  able  to  explain  this  high  mystery, 
and  show  that  there  are  some  incidental  advantages  to  be  derived 
from  the  existence  of  pain,  the  question  again  presses  itself  upon 
us,  Why  is  this  suffering  so  great — so  universal  ?  Why  do  the 
clouds  of  disappointment  cast  shadows  so  dark  and  so  broad  over 
the  prospects  of  human  life  ?  These  blackening  shadows  must 
surely  proceed  from  some  dark  and  dense  body  coming  between  us 


38  PHENOMENA   COMMONLY   OVERLOOKED. 

and  the  light  which  shines  so  brightly  and  so  beautifully  from* 
these  heavens, — and  what  can  that  opposing  and  obstructing  ob- 
stacle be?  Whence  the  universal  liability  to  disease?  Why 
such  wide-spread  famine  and  plague  and  pestilence?  Why  is 
this  little  infant  visited  with  such  grievous  and  continued  agony 
under  the  very  eye  of  a  mother,  whose  heart  meanwhile  is  torn 
as  much  as  is  the  bodily  frame  of  that  beloved  child  ?  Come 
with  us,  ye  sentimental  believers  in  the  perfectio  n  of  man  and  of 
this  world,  to  the  bedside  of  this  man,  tortured  continually  with 
excruciating  agony,  without  the  possibility  of  relief  being  afforded. 
For  many  years  has  he  been  tossed  there  as  you  now  see  him,, 
anq^  does  not  remember  of  a  single  moment's  respite  being  al- 
lowed him,  or  of  balmy  sleep  resting  on  these  eyes  to  drown  his- 
suffering  in  oblivion.  We  know  that  ye  turn  away  from  the  sightr 
and  leave  the  spot  as  speedily  as  possible :  but  it  is  good  for  us  to 
visit  the  house  of  mourning,  and  we  fix  you  here,  till  we  have  put 
some  questions,  which  you  may  answer  better  when  so  situated 
than  when  in  the  house  of  mirth,  and  when  you  look  on  this 
world  through  the  gorgeous  coloring,  with  which  romance  and 
poetry  stain  every  ray  that  passes  through  them.  Why,  then, 
this  protracted  suffering?  Perhaps  you  tell  us  that  it  is  to  teach 
the  sufferer  purity  and  patience.  Alas !  the  groans  that  break 
from  him,  the  bitterness  of  every  remark  that  escapes  his  lips,  all 
show  that  these  are  lessons  which  he  has  not  learned  ;  and  with- 
out a  special  heaven-sent  blessing,  it  is  difficult  to  discover  how 
they  should  be  the  natural  result  of  circumstances,  which  seem 
rather  fitted  to  irritate  the  spirit  into  peevishness,  or  exasperate  it 
into  fretfulness,  or  harden  it  into  sulkiness  and  rebellion.  And 
when  the  scene  darkens  from  twilight  obscurity  into  the  blackness 
of  night,  and  the  house  of  disease  becomes  the  house  of  death, 
the  phantoms,  thicken  and  increase.  Whence  these  terrors  of 
death,  and  the  awful  gloom  which  hangs  over  the  sepulchre  ? 
Why  should  it  be  so  ordered  that  man's  earthly  existence  should 
ever  lead  to,  and  end  in  a  dark  cavern,  into  which  all  men  go, 
but  into  which  the  eye  of  those  who  remain  behind  cannot  follow 
them,  and  from  which  no  one  returns  to  tell  what  are  his  state 
and  destiny. 

Ingenious  speculators,  we  are  aware,  have  discovered  that  many 
advantages  follow,  in  the  overruling  providence  of  God,  from  the 
existence  of  certain  real  or  apparent  evils.  We  freely  admit  that 
there  is  force  in  some  of  these  theories.  In  respect,  in  particular. 


SUFFERING,    BODILY    AND    MENTAL.  39 

of  the  death  of  the  lower  animals,  we  allow  that  there  may  be 
advantages  in  having  a  succession  of  generations  rather  than  con- 
tinuing the  existing  one,  and  such  a  system  of  course  implies  the 
dissolution  of  the  individual.  Nay,  we  may  freely  admit  that  there 
is  force  in  all  the  theories  advanced,  so  far  as  they  establish  the 
beneficence  of  God  in  bringing  good  out  of  evil,  though  we  may 
deny  that  they  explain  the  existence  of  the  evil.  But  let  us  ex- 
amine some  of  these  speculations.  We  take  up  those  of  Dr. 
Thomas  Brown,  because  they  seem  as  ingenious  and  plausible  as 
any  that  have  fallen  under  our  notice.* 

"If,"  says  he,  "by  exposure  to  the  common  causes  of  disease, 
we  were  to  expose  ourselves  only  to  a  succession  of  delightful 
feelings,  how  rash  would  those  be  who  are  even  at  present  rash?" 
When  one  hears  such  a  solution  as  this  seriously  proposed,  he  is 
tempted  to  ask  if  such  an  end,  the  preventing  of  rashness,  does 
really  require  such  an  expenditure  of  painful  means,  or  whether 
the  same  end  might  not  have  been  attained  by  other  means  less 
apparently  repugnant  to  the  character  of  God.  But  the  offered 
solution  starts  other  and  deeper  inquiries.  Not  satisfied  with  hear- 
ing from  the  Indian  that  the  world  rests  on  a  huge  animal,  we 
follow  him  with  the  inquiry,  On  what  does  the  animal  rest?  and 
not  satisfied  with  hearing  that  the  liability  to  pain  often  prevents 
mankind  from  exposing  themselves  to  disease,  we  farther  inquire, 
why  such  common  causes  of  disease  ? — why  such  rashness  on  the 
part  of  those  who  are  acknowledged  to  be  rash? — why  such  alarming 
evils  requiring  such  awful  warnings  of  their  approach  ?  Acknow- 
ledging, as  all  must,  that  they  are  incidental  advantages  arising 
from  the  existence  of  suffering  in  the  present  dispensation  of 
things,  there  is  the  other  problem  starting  into  view,  why  is  there 
such  a  constitution  of  things?  Why  the  need  of  one  evil  to 
counteract  another?  It  is  the  existence  of  so  many  evils  that  is 
the  grand  mystery  in  this  world ;  and  it  is  not  cleared  up  by  show- 
ing that  one  evil  is  incidentally  or  intentionally  the  preventive  of 
another. 

But  the  same  ingenious  thinker,  after  stating  the  various  ex- 
planatory considerations  adduced  by  Paley,  is  candid  enough  to  add 
— "  All  the  advantage,  however,  which  is  thus  produced  by  the 
painful  maladies  of  life,  I  readily  confess,  would  be  too  slight  to 
put  in  the  balance  with  the  amount  of  pain  which  arises  from 
these  maladies."  "The  true  preponderating  weight,  compared 
*  See  Lect.  93  of  PhiL  of  Human  Mind. 


40  PHENOMENA    COMMONLY    OVERLOOKED. 

with  which  every  other  circumstance  seems  almost  insignificant, 
*  *  is  the  relation  of  pain  to  moral  character.  It  is  of  advan- 
tage to  the  moral  character  in  two  ways,  as  warning  from  vice  by 
the  penalties  attached  to  vicious  conduct,  and  as  giving  strength 
to  virtue  by  the  benevolent  wishes  which  it  awakes  and  fosters, 
and  by  the  very  sufferings  themselves,  which  are  borne  with  a 
feeling  of  moral  approbation." 

Now,  this  solution,  while  it  approaches  a  little  nearer  the  truth, 
is  still  far  distant  from  it.  It  introduces  into  the  calculation  a 
most  important  element,  which  Paley  and  others  have  left  very 
much  out  of  account — the  consideration  of  virtue  and  vice ;  but 
it  does  not  allow  that  element  its  legitimate  weight.  Dr.  Brown 
has  evidently  discovered  the  unsatisfactory  nature  of  the  common 
explanations;  and  he  has  farther  observed,  that  the  economy  of 
the  world  has  a  reference  to  the  discouragement  of  vice  and  the 
encouragement  of  virtue,  but  while  the  truth  is  thus  opening  upon 
him,  he  refuses  to  follow  it.  The  light  of  which  he  has  now  got 
a  glimpse  might  have  conducted  him  to  the  discovery  of  that  per- 
fection of  the  Divine  character  which  leads  God  to  withdraw  him- 
self from  vicious  conduct ;  but  scared  by  the  too  dazzling  brightness 
of  such  an  attribute,  and  losing  sight  of  it  when  it  was  urging 
him  onwards,  he  hastens  to  betake  himself  to  the  softer  and 
flowery  regions  of  sentiment  and  poetny,  in  which  he  ever  delights 
to  expatiate,  and  in  which  he  affords  rest  to  himself  and  his  read- 
ers after  they  have  followed  him  in  his  feats  of  intellectual 
agility. 

So  far  as  Dr.  Brown  conceives  that,  in  the  infliction  of  suffering, 
God  has  a  reference  to  the  encouragement  of  virtue  and  the  dis- 
couragement of  vice,  his  views  are  clear  and  solid  and  consistent. 
He  has  discovered  that  there  is  a  greater  evil  than  mere  pain,  and 
a  greater  good  than  mere  pleasure ;  and  that  the  pain  which  ex- 
ists in  the  world  cannot  be  explained  except  in  its  relation  to 
the  greater  good  and  the  greater  evil.  Instead  of  the  "  greatest 
happiness"  principle,  he  might  have  seen  what  we  may  call  the 
"greatest  morality"  principle ;  and  the  idea,  if  prosecuted,  would 
have  conducted  him  to  a  firm  resting-place,  on  which  he  might 
have  contemplated  the  full  character  of  God,  and  His  dealings 
towards  a  world  which  would  have  been  seen  by  him  as  fallen. 
But  when  the  grand  reconciling  truth  was  just  dawning  upon  his 
mind,  he  turns  to  another  truth  which  has  but  sufficient  im- 
portance to  distract  his  attention.  "There  will,"  he  says,  'cbe  a 


SUFFERING,    BODILY    AND    MENTAL.  41 

quicker  disposition  to  feel  for  others  when  we  ourselves  have 
suffered, :  Does  God,  then,  create  pain  that  men  may  feel  for  it? 
"  The  grief  of  one,"  he  adds,  "  is  the  pity  of  many,  and  there 
must  be  grief  if  there  be  pity."  Does  he  mean  to  say  that  the 
grand  aim  of  God  in  inflicting  grief  was  to  cause  pity  on  the  part 
of  many?  Surely  if  this  had  been  the  whole,  or  the  chief  end 
contemplated  by  God,  it  might  have  been  attained  at  a  less  expense 
of  pain  and  sorrow.  Besides,  it  is  not  to  be  forgotten  that,  if  lia- 
bility to  pain  and  sorrow  be  a  means  of  strengthening  virtue,  it  is 
also  a  means  of  encouraging  vice.  Do  not  all  the  malignant 
passions  of  our  nature,  such  as  envy,  jealousy,  and  revenge,  derive 
their  main  force  and  motive  to  action  from  the  circumstance  that 
it  is  possible  to  inflict  suffering,  mental  and  bodily?  Had  man 
been  placed  in  a  state  of  things  in  which  it  was  not  possible  for 
him  to  produce  painful  sensations  or  feelings,  the  malign  affections 
would  not  have  reigned  with  such  fury  as  they  do  in  a  world  so 
constituted  as  to  admit  of  their  being  gratified.  It  is  the  very  fact 
that  our  fellow-men  are  liable  to  be  injured,  which  is  the  prompt- 
ing occasion  of  scandal,  and  of  the  fearful  contests  and  fiery  feuds 
which  cannot  be  extinguished  except  in  blood.  If  there  be  inci- 
dental advantages  arising  from  the  existence  of  suffering,  there  are 
also,  it  appears,  accompanying  disadvantages,  and  these  latter,  we 
fear,  through  the  wickedness  of  the  race,  very  considerably  the 
greater.  Every  reflecting  mind  will  at  least  acknowledge  that, 
when  the  elements  to  be  weighed  and  measured  are  virtue  and 
vice,  it  will  be  difficult  to  get  proper  balances,  and  a  true  standard 
of  measure ;  *  and  difficult,  above  all  things,  to  say  what  is  the 
actual  residue  on  the  one  side  or  the  other,  after  the  proper  sub- 
tractions have  been  made. 

"If,"  says  the  same  author,  "the  inhabitant  of  some  other  plan- 
et were  to  witness  the  kindness  and  solicitude  of  a  father  for  his 
child  in  his  long  watchfulness  and  love,  and  were  then  to  see  the 
same  father  force  the  child,  notwithstanding  its  cries,  to  swallow 
some  bitter  potion,  he  would  surely  conclude,  not  that  the  father 
was  cruel,  but  that  the  child  was  to  derive  benefit  from  the  potion 
which  he  loathed."  This  explanation  is  approximating  still  nearer 
the  truth,  but  is  not  pursued^to  its  proper  consequences.  It  pro- 

*  The  reader  will  remember  the  language  of  Burke — "  Weighing,  as  it  were,  in 
scales  hung  in  a  shop  of  horrors  so  much  actual  crime  against  so  much  contingent 
advantage,  and  after  putting  in  and  out  weights,  declaring  that  the  balance  was  on 
the  side  of  the  advantage." 


42  PHENOMENA    COMMONLY    OVERLOOKED. 

ceeds  on  the  idea  that  pain  is  a  medicine  for  one  who  is  laboring 
under  disease,  and  that  a  disease  in  the  very  nature  of  man.  What 
a  picture — what  a  dark  picture  is  thereby  given  of  our  world  as 
laboring  under  a  fearful  malady  !  Prosecute  the  idea,  and  it  will 
conduct  us  to  truths  fiotn  which  many  shrink  back  when  they  are 
close  upon  them;  and  it  will  appear  as  if  God  was  conducting  His 
government  as  toward  a  world  distempered  in  itself,  and  as  in  a  state 
displeasing  to  him.  Does  not  the  extent  of  the  remedy,  too,  prove 
the  extent  of  the  disease,  as  certainly  as  the  number  of  prisons 
in  a  country  demonstrates  the  extent  of  the  crime?  Without  at 
present  starting  the  question,  whether  the  suffering  which  God  in- 
flicts may  not  be  punitive  as  well  as  remedial ;  it  appears  that  the 
infliction  of  it  proceeds  on  the  principle,  that  there  is  a  fearful  evil 
of  which  it  is  the  punishment  or  the  cure.  Has  this  idea  been 
followed  out,  or  rather  has  it  not  been  speedily  abandoned  after  it 
has  served  a  particular  purpose?  It  is  at  least  worthy  of  being 
carried  out  to  its  proper  results,  and  may  conduct  us  to  some  very 
exalted  views  of  the  character  of  God,  and  some  very  humbling 
views  of  the  character  of  man. 

But  leaving  these  subtilties  of  Brown,  we  may  remark  on  the 
general  subject,  that  the  explanations  of  the  kind  at  present  refer- 
red to,  all  proceed  on  the  principle  that  each  man  is  designed  by 
God,  and  is  bound  in  himself  to  promote  the  greatest  happiness  of 
the  race.  In  regard  to  this  principle,  it  might  be  remarked,  that 
it  is  more  than  a  mere  selfish  principle — it  is  a  moral  principle. 
There  may  be  nothing  moral  in  the  principle  which  leads  each  man 
to  promote  his  own  happiness ;  but  when  it  assumes  this  special  form, 
that  man  is  bound  to  contemplate  the  happiness  of  the  race,  it  be- 
comes a  moral  principle;  and  it  is  by  the  principle  in  this  its  latter 
form,  that  any  intelligent  inquirer  would  propose  to  explain  the  exist- 
ence of  suffering.  God  has  so  constituted  man,  that  he  feels  that 
he  ought  to  submit,  when  needful,  to  individual  suffering,  in  order 
to  promote  the  general  good ;  and  it  might  be  argued,  that  the 
God  who  implanted  such  a  principle  in  man's  bosom,  must  him- 
self be  possessed  of  this  moral  quality,  and  to  an  infinite  degree. 
But  without  dwelling  on  this  for  the  present,  we  insist  that  there 
are  unequivocal  evidences  not  a  few  that  suffering  has  a  reference 
to  moral  excellence  fully  as  much  as  to  happiness ;  and  as  such, 
is  clearly  demonstrative  of  the  Divine  approbation  of  such 
excellence. 

We  hold  that  this  conclusion  is  specially  deducible  from  the  ex- 


RESTRAINTS    AND    PENALTIES.  43 

istence  of  mental  suffering.  The  plausible  explanations  given 
of  the  bodily  sufferings  of  man  on  the  greatest  happiness  principle, 
do  not  admit  of  an  application  to  mental  pain  under  many  of  its 
forms.  Certain  mental  states — certain  lusts  and  passions,  for  in- 
stance— lead  to  the  most  acute  mental  distress,  naturally  and 
necessarily  ;  and  this  distress  may  be  held  as  indicative  of  God's 
disapproval  of  these  states.  No  man  can  assert,  with  even  the 
semblance  of  plausibility,  that  the  misery  in  such  cases  is  ap- 
pointed, in  order  to  prevent  greater  misery;  for  the  phenomenon 
to  be  explained,  is  the  existence  of  the  misery,  either  under  its 
milder,  or  under  its  more  appalling  forms.  It  is  no  explanation 
of  the  lesser  acute  distress,  which  follows  the  first  kindling  of  evil 
affections  to  point  to  the  fact,  that  these  evil  affections  if  cherished 
must  issue  in  greater  distress.  The  very  proportioning  of  the 
mental  pain  to  the  degree  of  the  sin,  points  the  more  conclusively 
and  emphatically  to  the  divinly  appointed  connection  between 
them.  The  divine  indignation  manifested  against  sin  in  its  lesser 
forms,  rises  and  swells  according  as  the  sin  increases,  and  mani- 
fests itself  in  the  infliction  of  ever  deepening  misery ;  and  the 
connection  between  the  cause  and  the  consequence  is  indicated  by 
the  very  fact,  that  as  the  one  increases,  so  does  the  other — that  as 
the  rain  falls,  so  do  the  floods  swell.  It  is  not  the  misery  that  God 
is  warning  us  against ;  but  it  is  against  the  sin,  and  by  means  of 
the  misery.  A  voice  from  heaven  could  scarcely  declare  more 
clearly,  and  certainly  could  not  announce  so  impressively,  that 
there  are  certain  mental  affections  which  God  would  brand  with 
the  stigma  of  his  severest  reprobation. 

Enough  has  been  advanced,  at  least,  to  show  that  this  univer- 
sal and  divinely  inflicted  suffering  in  body  and  in  mind  stands 
out  as  a  grand  mystery,  worthy  of  an  attempt  being  made  to  ex- 
plain it ;  and  that  the  common  explanations  just  throw  so  much 
light  upon  its  outskirts  as  to  impress  us  the  more  with  its  vast 
magnitude  and  profundity,  and  the  desirableness  of  more  light 
being  let  in  to  dispel  the  gloom. 

SECTION  III— THE  RESTRAINTS  AND  PENALTIES  OF  DIVINE 
PROVIDENCE. 

It  might  be  interesting  to  know  what  are  the  means  which 
God  employs  in  the  governments  of  those  worlds  in  which  there 
is  no  taint  of  evil.  Can  we  be  wrong  in  concluding  that  the 
main  instrument,  whatever  may  be  the  subsidiary  ones,  is  a  grand 


44  PHENOMENA    COMMONLY    OVERLOOKED. 

internal  principle  by  which  the  creature  is  swayed — being  an  im- 
perative sense  of  duty,  and  the  love  of  God  reigning  in  the  soul 
and  subordinating  all  things  to  itself?  This,  we  must  believe,  is 
the  bond,  stronger  than  the  gravitation  drawing  the  planets  to  the 
sun,  which  holds  the  pure  intelligences  in  their  spheres,  and  joins 
them  to  the  grand  centre  of  all  wisdom  and  life. 

But  whatever  may  be  the  means  which  God  employs  in  gov- 
erning other  intelligences,  it  is  obvious,  even  at  the  first  glance, 
and  farther  inquiry  deepens  the  conviction,  that  this  is  not  the 
way  in  which  he  rules  the  world  in  which  we  dwell.  Man  is 
placed  under  an  economy,  in  which  there  are  numberless  re- 
straints, correctives,  medicaments,  and  penalties,  all  originating 
in  the  very  constitution  of  the  world,  and  falling  out  in  the  order 
of  Providence,  and  ready  to  meet  him  at  every  turn — now  with 
their  bristling  points  to  stop  his  career,  and  anon  with  their  whips 
to  punish — and  forthwith  with  their  counter  moves  to  destroy  all 
his  labor,  and  throw  him  far  back  when  he  seemed  to  be  making 
the  most  eager  progress.  Man  has  liberty  of  will,  (such  as  all 
responsible  beings  must  possess,)  but  he  has  not  liberty  of  action 
in  every  case ;  and  even  when  he  has  freedom  of  action,  his  ac- 
tions are  not  allowed  to  produce  their  contemplated  results;  for 
while  he  proposes,  another  interposes  and  disposes,  and  his 
schemes  are  often  made  to  terminate  in  consequences  directly 
antagonist  to  those  designed  by  him.  "  Circumstances,"  says 
Niebuhr,  in  the  passage  already  quoted,  "  which  are  called  acci- 
dental, combine  in  such  a  wonderful  manner  with  others  to  pro- 
duce certain  results,  that  men  evidently  cannot  do  what  they 
please."  Man  is  hemmed  in,  thwarted,  and  arrested  on  all  sides. 
Restrained  on  either  hand,  there  are  instruments  lying  ready  all 
around  for  his  punishment ;  and  these  are  often  wielded  by  a 
hand  of  fearful  and  irresistible  strength,  or  set  in  motion  by  latent 
powers  possessed  of  electric  velocity. 

We  discover  everywhere  in  this  world  traces  of  design  and 
wisdom  ;  but  of  design  and  wisdom  so  far  as  the  government  of 
man  is  concerned,  directed  to  the  prevention  or  punishment  of 
evil.  When  we  go  into  a  well-built  and  well-regulated  school,  or 
an  hospital,  or  an  asylum,  or  a  house  of  correction,  or  a  prison, 
we  may  observe  the  most  beautiful  adaptation  of  part  to  part,  and 
of  each  part  and  all  the  parts  to  the  whole  ;  and  we  pronounce 
the  building,  its  furniture,  and  the  work  done  in  it,  to  be  perfect, 
but  we  discover  at  the  same  time  that  they  are  accommodated  to 


RESTRAINTS    AND    PENALTIES.  45 

inmates  who  are  not  regarded  as  perfect.  We  see  everywhere 
vigilance  and  caution,  and  instruments  provided  by  suspicion  or 
fear,  and  means  of  restraint,  of  improvement,  and  of  punishment, 
which  would  not  have  been  required  but  for  the  existence  of  evil ; 
and  we  conclude  from  the  very  character  of  the  building,  and  the 
work  which  goes  on  in  it,  that  there  is  ignorance,  or  poverty,  or 
disease,  or  crime  in  the  dwelling.  We  may  admire  the  architec- 
ture of  the  fabric,  and  the  mode  of  conducting  the  establishment, 
and  we  may  feel  the  deepest  interest,  too,  in  the  inmates  ;  but  we 
observe  that  the  existence  of  evil  is  everywhere  pre-supposed  in 
the  very  provision  made  to  cure,  to  check,  and  to  punish  it.  Now, 
looking  at  this  world  with  an  observant  eye,  we  find  at  all  times 
and  in  every  place  a  singular  apparatus  of  means,  proceeding 
upon  and  implying  the  existence  of  evil.  It  does  look  as  if  this 
world,  under  the  government  of  God,  were  a  school,  if  we  would 
so  use  it,  for  the  improvement  of  the  inhabitants — or  as  if  it 
might  be  a  place  of  restraint  (where  "  man  is  a  galley  slave,  pun- 
ished but  not  amended"*)  in  which  the  prisoner  is  confined,  al- 
ways with  a  certain  liberty  allowed  him  till  a  day  of  judgment. 
Without  taking  into  account  the  existence  of  human  folly  and 
wickedness,  our  eye  will  ever  fix  itself  on  a  machinery,  always  in 
motion  but  seemingly  without  a  purpose  to  serve  by  it — as  use- 
less as  the  furniture  of  a  school-room,  or  an  hospital,  or  a  prison, 
where  there  was  no  ignorance  to  remove,  no  disease  to  remedy, 
or  crime  to  punish.  Why  such  abrupt  terminations  to  long  ave- 
nues which  lead  to  nothing? — why  such  " withered  hopes  that 
never  come  to  flower  ?" — why  such  numberless  and  ever-acting 
checks? — why  such  sudden  and  visible  judgments  of  heaven? — 
why  such  bridles  to  curb,  such  chains  to  bind,  and  such  walls  to 
confine,  if  the  inhabitants  of  this  world  are  reckoned  pure  and 
spotless  by  Him  who  rules  them? 

An  intelligent  visitant,  let  us  suppose,  from  a  remote  island  of 
the  ocean,  or  a  distant  planet  of  our  system,  alights  on  the  isle  of 
St.  Helena,  at  the  time  when  Napoleon  Buonaparte  was  confined 
in  it.  Totally  unacquainted  with  the  previous  history  of  that 
wonderful  man,  he  has  to  gather  all  his  information  from  personal 
observation  and  inference.  Himself  unnoticed,  he  walks  about 
and  surveys  the  strange  circumstances  which  present  themselves 
to  his  view.  His  attention  is  soon  fixed*  on  an  individual,  dis- 
covered by  him  to  be  the  principal  personage  on  the  island,  and 

*  Custine. 


46  PHENOMENA    COMMONLY    OVERLOOKED. 

he  observes  that  all  the  arrangements  made  by  others  have  a  re~ 
lation,  more  or  less,  directly  and  immediately  to  him.  He  would 
seem  to  be  the  monarch  of  the  whole  territory,  and  yet  it  appears 
that  he  is  confined  and  suspected  on  every  hand.  He  has  a  cer- 
tain degree  of  liberty  allowed,  and  he  is  ever  asserting  it  and 
seeking  its  extension,  while  he  is  jealous  in  the  extreme  of  the 
supposed  attempts  to  deprive  him  of  it,  and  complaining  loudly  of 
the  restraints  laid  upon  him.  It  is-  observed,  that  the  persons  by 
whom  he  is  surrounded  pay  him  all  respect  and  deference  ;  while 
they  are  at  the  very  time  watching  and  guarding  him,  and  ready, 
if  he  go  beyond  prescribed  limits,  to  resort  to  bolder  measures. 
This  personage,  it  is  farther  observed,  has  in  his  manner  an  air 
of  dignity  which  impresses  the  spectator  with  awe,  while  he  has 
also  an  air  of  restlessness  and  discontent  which  moves  him  to 
pity.  What  reasonable  conclusion  can  the  traveller  draw  from 
this  strange  combination  and  jumble  of  seeming  contradictions? 
He  knows  not,  for  a  time,  what  to  think.  There  are  times  when 
he  is  confident  that  this  individual,  on  whom  all  eyes  are  fixed,  is 
a  king ;  but  then  he  sees  him  watched  and  suspected  as  if  he 
were  a  felon.  He  concludes  that,  he  may  be  a  bondsman  or  a 
prisoner ;  but  this  conclusion  is  confounded  when  he  reflects  that 
a  certain  freedom  is  permitted  him,  that  great  honor  is  paid  him, 
and  that  there  are  traces  of  greatness  and  power  in  his  manner 
and  character.  It  is  possible  that  the  traveller,  after  perplexing 
himself  for  a  time,  may  give  up  all  idea  of  resolving  the  mystery. 
Perhaps  it  may  not  occur  to  him  that  the  opposite  and  seemingly 
inconsistent  phenomena  which  present  themselves  may  be  com- 
bined in  a  consistent  result,  or  as  the  German  metaphysicians  would 
say,  in  a  higher  unity ;  but  should  the  idea  occur,  and  he  prose- 
cute it  sufficiently  far,  it  will  at  once  conduct  him  to  a  solution  of 
his  difficulties,  and  the  truth  may  now  open  to  him  and  show  him 
in  this  personage  a  fallen  monarch,  with  renlains  of  former  gran- 
deur, confined  here  for  a  time,  and  with  only  a  certain  degree  of 
freedom  and  authority  allowed  him.  The  idea  may  not  at  once 
suggest  itself  to  the  mind  of  the  traveller;  but  should  it  occur  to 
his  mind,  or  be  brought  under  his  notice,  it  will  at  once  recom- 
mend itself  to  his  reason.  In  particular,  should  he  now  meet 
with  some  individual  who  relates  the  previous  history  of  Na- 
poleon, dwelling  specially  on  his  greatness  and  degradation, 
lie  is  prepared  to  credit  his  informant,  and  he  feels  now  as  if 
the  mystery  was  unfolded,  and  that  all  difficulties  have  vanished. 


THE    DISTANCE    OP    GOD    FROM    MAN.  47 

No  illustration  should  be  carried  beyond  the  purpose  contem- 
plated ;  and  that  now  used,  is  merely  intended  to  exhibit  the 
kind  of  plaited  chain,  which  observation  and  reasoning  joining 
together  will  be  inclined  to  construct  out  of  the  complex  materials 
before  us,  when  we  look  at  the  relation  in  which  man  stands  to 
the  world.  We  cannot  avoid  discovering  proofs  of  man's  gran- 
deur and  dignity.  All  nature,  inanimate,  instinctive,  and  sen- 
tient, recognizes  him  as  its  superior  and  its  lord,  and  ministers  to 
his  comfort.  Provision  is  made  for  his  numerous  wants  by  a 
complicated,  but  most  skilfully  arranged  machinery.  Then  what 
noble  mental  faculties  in  his  inner  man  ;  what  deep  speculations  ; 
what  rich  emotions  ;  what  far-reaching  projects  and  anticipations  ! 
There  are  persons  who  look  to  man  exclusively  under  these 
fairer  aspects,  and  never  cease  to  discourse  of  his  greatness  and 
goodness.  But  other  circumstances  force  themselves  on  the  atten- 
tion of  those  who  keep  their  mind  open  for  the  reception  of  the 
whole  truth.  All  things  sublunary  have  a  reference  more  or  less 
direct  to  man ;  but  many  of  the  divine  arrangements  are  fitted 
to  leave  the  impression,  that  God  cannot  trust  mankind  in  respect 
of  their  wisdom,  or  goodness,  or  integrity  of  purpose.  We  may 
observe  ever  watchful  sentinels  guarding  him  ;  and  we  learn  that 
force  is  ever  ready  to  be  employed  if  certain  limits  are  past,  and 
certain  stringent  regulations  transgressed.  We  discover  every- 
where signs  of  littleness  and  restlessness,  of  meanness  and  of 
crime.  There  are  divines  who  fix  their  eyes  exclusively  upon  the 
features  of  humanity  last  named,  and  conclude  that  man  is  now 
lower  than  the  beasts  that  perish.  While  partial  and  prejudiced 
minds  would  confine  their  attention  to  one  or  other  of  these  views, 
the  enlarged  soul  would  contemplate  both,  and  go  out  in  search 
of  some  doctrine  comprehensive  enough  to  embrace  all.  Apart 
from  positive  information  as  to  the  history  of  the  world,  from  tra- 
dition or  professed  revelation,  he  may  find  himself  baffled  in  all  his 
conjectures  ;  but  should  the  idea  be  presented  to  him  of  original 
perfection  and  a  subsequent  fall,  he  feels  now  as  if  he  had  ob- 
tained what  he  wanted — a  truth  which  gives  consistency  and 
coherence  to  every  other  truth.  But  of  this  more  hereafter. 

SECTION  IV.— THE  DISTANCE  OF  GOD  FROM  MAN. 

Assuming  that  God  is  a  being  of  infinite  wisdom  and  love,  ii 
does  seem  mysterious  that  he  should  not  have  devised  means  by 


48  PHENOMENA    COMMONLY    OVERLOOKED. 

which  his  intelligent  creatures  on  the  earth  may  enter  into  com- 
munion with  him.  A  very  little  observation  suffices  to  discover 
the  wonderful  pains  which  have  been  taken  with  man,  in  creat- 
ing him  at  first,  in  endowing  him  with  bodily  organs  and  mental 
faculties,  in  opening  to  him  sources  of  knowledge,  and  placing  a 
multitude  of  resources  at  his  command.  What  high  intelligence  ! 
What  far-sighted  sagacity  !  What  fields,  rich  and  fertile,  placed 
around  him,  inviting  him  to  enter  to  dig  for  treasures  and  to 
gather  fruits.  It  does  seem  strange,  that  God  in  endowing  man 
with  such  lofty  powers,  should  not  have  furnished  him  with  fac- 
ulties to  communicate  with  his  Maker  and  Governor.  God  has 
connected  soul  and  body  closely  and  intimately,  so  that  the  one 
can  correspond  with  the  other  ;  but  by  neither  can  he  correspond 
with  the  author  of  his  existence.  He  has  given  senses  by  which 
to  communicate  with  the  world  around ;  but  he  has  given  no 
bodily  or  mental  sense  by  which  to  hold  communion  with  God. 
He  has  enabled  us  to  hold  pleasant  and  profitable  intercourse  with 
our  fellow-creatures ;  but  through  no  natural  channels  can  we 
enjoy  direct  society  with  God.  It  looks  meanwhile  as  if  it  was 
intended  that  man  should  enjoy  such  communion  ;  and  when  we 
reflect,  first  upon  his  capacity,  and  then  upon  his  actual  attain- 
ment, we  feel  in  much  the  same  way  as  when  we  survey  the 
eyeballs  of  the  blind,  and  then  learn  that  they  cannot  see.  It  is 
a  mystery  requiring  to  be  unravelled,  that  God  should  throw  open 
in  such  ungrudging  munificence  the  works  of  nature,  that  man 
may  expatiate  in  them  at  pleasure ;  and  yet  that  he  should  have 
kept  himself  at  such  an  awful  and  unapproachable  distance,  and 
shut  himself  as  if  studiously  from  our  view.  The  telescope  which 
he  has  enabled  man  to  form,  looks  into  distances  of  space  which 
cannot  be  calculated,  and  the  discoveries  of  geology  look  into  ages 
which  cannot  be  numbered  ;  but  whether  we  look  above,  or  be- 
hind, or  before,  we  cannot  anywhere  within  this  wide  expanse 
which  we  have  explored,  reach  immediate  intercourse  with  the 
Being  of  whom  we  yet  know  that  he  dwells  somewhere,  or  rather 
everywhere  within  it.  In  contact  everywhere  with  the  creature, 
man  is  in  felt  contact  nowhere  with  the  Creator ;  though  it 
might  seem  as  if  the  immediate  contemplation  of  God  and  fellow- 
ship with  him  was  an  infinitely  higher  and  more  profitable  exer- 
cise, could  he  only  reach  it,  than  any  intercourse  which  he  can 
have  with  the  workmanship  of  his  hands. 

Why  does  God  thus  keep  at  such  a  distance  from  creatures 


THE    DISTANCE    OF    GOD    FROM    MAN.  49 

otherv/ise  so  highly  favored?  If  man's  soul,  like  his  body,  be 
mortal,  how  strange  that  a  spirit  so  noble  in  itself  and  so  richly 
endowed  should  be  annihilated  without  once  coming  in  con- 
tact with  the  great  Spirit  of  the  universe.  If  man's  soul  be 
immortal,  as  the  great  and  good  in  all  ages  have  believed,  why 
does  not  God  deign  to  instruct  him  in  his  future  and  eternal 
destiny  'I 

God,  it  is  true,  is  known  by  us  to  be  very  near,  and  yet  we  feel 
him  to  be  at  an  infinite  distance.  He  seems  as  if  approaching  us, 
and  yet  he  is  unapproachable.  Men  call  upon  him,  and  feel  as 
if  they  were  invited  to  call  upon  him,  and  yet  he  deigns  no  an- 
swer. There  is  the  prayer  of  the  inquirer  for  light,  the  complaint 
of  the  sufferer,  and  the  cry  of  doubt  and  despair,  and  yet  these 
heavens  continued  shut  and  silent.  "  Even  to-day  is  my  com- 
plaint bitter,  my  stroke  is  heavier  tha^i  my  groaning.  Oh  that  I 
knew  where  I  might  find  him,  that  I  might  come  even  to  his 
seat.''"  Such  have  been  the  complaint  and  the  demand  of 
many,  who  have  been  constrained,  when  no  answer  is  given,  to 
add,  "  Behold,  I  go  forward,  but  he  is  not  there  ;  and  backward, 
but  I  cannot  perceive  him ;  on  the  left  hand,  where  he  doth  work, 
but  I  cannot  behold  him  ;  he  hideth  himself  on  the  right,  hand,  that 
I  cannot  see  him."  The  deepest  thinkers  have  been  in  deeps  in 
which  they  saw  no  light.  "  The  whole  hemisphere  of  contem- 
plation," says  Poster,  *•'  appears  inexpressibly  strange  and  mys- 
terious. It  is  cloud  pursuing  cloud,  forest  after  forest,  and  Alps 
upon  Alps."  The  wild  infidel  (we  mean  Rousseau)  proposes  a 
test  by  which  he  may  determine  whether  a  God  exists.  He  is  to 
throw  a  stone  at  a  particular  tree,  if  it  strikes  the  tree,  he  con- 
cludes in  the  affirmative  ;  and  if  it  does  not  strike  the  tree,  he 
concludes  in  the  negative.  He  performs  the  act,  and  God  takes 
no  notice  of  it,  but  stands  apart  in  solemn  majesty,  as  if  He  could 
not  condescend  to  give  light  to  the  inquirer.  The  frenzied  poet 
(Shelley)  writes  Atheist  after  his  name,  among  the  grandest  of  the 
works  of  God,,  and  the  rocks  do  not  rend,  the  mountains  do  not 
quake,  and  the  lakes  sleep  on  as  calmly  in  their  rocky  bosoms, 
and  the  streams  leap  with  as  lively  and  prattling  a  play  as  if  they 
rejoiced  in  all  that  was  done.  Man  wanders  in  the  mazes  of 
error,  and  God  does  not  interfere  to  set  him  right,  though  He 
sometimes  seems  to  interpose  in  order  to  punish.  Errors  descend 
from  generation  to  generation,  through  regions  wide  as  India,  and 
thickly  peopled  as  China,  and  the  stream  is  allowed  to  flow  on. 

4 


50  PHENOMENA    COMMONLY    OVERLOOKED. 

The  sorrowful  complain  of  this  silence  as  cruel.  The  doubting 
feel  as  if  it  was  unreasonable.  The  sceptic  lays  his  fabric  on 
these  doubts  and  difficulties  as  on  a  foundation  of  ruins.  Mean- 
while. God's  works  move  on  as  if  he  was  unconscious  of  all 
this,  or  as  if  nature  knew  no  higher  power  than  blind  caprice  01 
self-developing  law. 

There  are  persons  who,  on  observing  this  silence  and  apparent 
reparation  of  God  from  mankind,  conclude  that  God  has  ceased 
to  take  any  interest  in  the  world.  The  ancient  Epicureans  and 
.Sadducees,  and  the  Epicureans  and  Sadducees  of  every  age, 
have  elevated  God  to  an  ethereal  region,  where  he  cannot  be  dis- 
turbed by  the  noise  and  folly,  by  the  cries  and  complaints  of 
his  creatures.  But  facts  belonging  to  a  different  order  force  them- 
selves upon  our  notice.  While  God  stands  apparently  at  so  un- 
approachable a  distance,  there  are  yet  intimations  of  his  being 
very  near  and  ever  watchful.  Man  sometimes  wishes  that  God 
would  let  him  alone.  He  complains  of  the  strict  and  jealous  care 
which  God  takes  of  him.  "  Let  me  alone,  for  my  days  are  vanity. 
What  is  man  that  thou  shouldest  magnify  him,  and  that  thou 
shouldest  set  thine  heart  upon  him,  and  that  thou  shouldest  visit 
him  every  morning,  and  try  him  every  moment?  How  long 
wilt  thou  not  depart  from  me  ?"  But  God  shows  that  he  will  not 
let  man  alone.  God  has  within  every  human  breast  a  witness 
for  himself  monitorial  of  guilt,  and  pointing  to  coming  punish- 
ment. He  has  various  ways  of  indicating  that  he  has  never,  for 
one  instant,  been  unobservant  of  the  conduct  of  his  creatures. 
Nemesis  has  always  been  represented  as  seeming  to  tarry,  but 
making  her  appearance  most  opportunely  at  last.  When  man's 
passion  is  strong,  and  bent  upon  indulgence,  avenging  justice  may 
seem  as  if  it  was  standing  aside,  and  inattentive;  but  it  is  only 
that  it  may  seize  him  with  a  more  powerful  grasp  in  the  state  of 
exhaustion  that  follows.  When  the  plots  of  cunning  and  deceit 
are  successful,  it  may  look  as  if  God  did  not  observe  human 
affairs ;  but  when  the  dishonest  man  is  caught  at  last,  he  finds  it 
to  be  in  toils  which  have  for  years  been  weaving  for  him.  Na- 
poleon, on  his  march  to  Moscow,  concluded  that  he  could  com- 
mand his  destiny ;  but  when  the  nations  of  Europe,  alarmed  at 
his  ambition,  shut  him  up  in  St.  Helena,  every  man  saw  that  his 
destiny  had,  instead,  been  all  the  time  carrying  him  along,  as  the 
stream  bears  upon  its  surface  the  bubbles  which  its  waters  have 
formed.  It  not  unfrequently  happens  that  every  opposing  power, 


THE    DISTANCE    OP    GOD   PROM    MAN.  51 

which  the  wicked  thought  he  had  crushed,  rises  up  to  pursue  and 
punish  him,  when  the  tide  of  fortune  is  Burning  against  him. 
Every  drop  of  that  cup  of  bitter  elements,  which  he  has  been  fill- 
ing for  others,  he  must  drink  himself  when  he  has  filled  up  the 
measure  of  his  iniquities.  The  fagots  which  he  has  been  col- 
lecting for  the  destruction  of  others  all  go  to  augment  the  flame  of 
his  own  funeral  pile.  The  drunkard  is  not  more  certainly  haunted 
by  the  frightful  apparitions  called  up  by  the  disease  which  fol- 
lows excess,  than  crime  is  followed  by  its  avenging  spirits.  There 
is,  if  we  may  so  speak,  a  gathering  arid  closing  in  at  the  death, 
and  that  to  behold  his  agonies  and  humiliation,  of  all  the  powers 
which  have  been  in  scattered  scent  and  pursuit  of  him  throughout 
the  whole  hunting-ground  of  his  career.  It  is  fabled  of  the  drown- 
ing man,  that  in  the  brief  space  of  time  that  precedes  unconscious- 
ness, every  event  of  his  past  life  .passes  in  rapid  review  before  his 
eyes,  and  there  is  certainly  something  of  this  harrying,  in  the 
avenging  events  all  having  a  connection  with  his  past  life,  which 
God  crowds  on  one  another  to  make  the  ambitious,  and  proud, 
nnd  malignant,  discover,  that  He  has  all  along  been  ruling  their 
destiny. 

Now,  combine  these  two  classes  of  facts,  the  apparent  distance 
of  God,  and  yet  his  nearness  intimated  in  various  ways,  his 
seeming  unconcern  and  yet  constant  watchfulness  ;  and  we  see 
only  one  consistent  conclusion  which  can  be  evolved,  that  God  re- 
gards man  as  a  criminal,  from  whom  he  must  withdraw  himself, 
but  whom  he  must  not  allow  to  escape. 

An  individual,  we  may  suppose,  has  committed  a  horrible 
Berime  when  intoxicated,  and  is  committed  to  prison,  while  yet  in 
xi  Kinte  of  unconsciousness.  On  awakening  to  reflection,  he 
would  make  inquiry  as  to  his  past  or  present  state;  but  he  finds 
<haf.  there  is  none  to  answer  him.  He  utters  a  cry  of  alarm  or 
.  agony,  but  no  reply  is  given.  He  would  conclude  that  he  is  aban- 
doned by  all;  but  on  turning  round  and  round,  he  finds  prison 
walls,  with  only  so  much  of  the  light  of  heaven  shining  through, 
as  to  show  that  pains  have  been  taken  to  render  his  escape  hope- 
less. What  other  conclusion  can  he  draw  than  that  he  is  shut 
up  in  prison,  awaiting  the  time  when  he  is  to  be  brought  out  to 
ii'ial?  Does  it  not  seem  as  if  man  was  in  a  somewhat  similar 
position,  abandoned  and  yet  watched,  spared  in  life,  and  yet  spared 
as  if  for  trial  ?  And  it  were  well  if,  instead  of  seeking  to  drown 
misery  by  frantic  merriment,  or  to  beat  uselessly  against  his  prison 


52          PHENOMENA  COMMONLY  OVERLOOKED. 

walls,  he  was  endeavoring  to  realize  the  nature  and  extent  of  thai 
crime,  of  which  he  is  but  half-conscious,  and  anxiously  inquiring 
if  there  be  not  some  way  of  averting  the  judgment  which  may 
won  be  pronounced  against  him. 

SECTION  V.— THE  DISTANCE  OF  MAN  FROM  GOD. 

The  facts  which  present  themselves  under  this  head  are 
precisely  the  counterpart  of  those  which  we  have  been  consider- 
ing under  the  last.  There  is  both  an  attracting  and  repelling 
principle. 

First,  there  is  a  feeling  in  man  prompting  him  to  seek  God,  if 
haply  he  may  find  him.  Passing  feelings  of  gratitude,  the  fear 
of  danger,  the  keen  sense  of  sin,  the  fear  of  punishment — all 
these  would  draw  or  drive  him  into  the  presence  of  God.  There 
are  certain  times  in  the  lives  of  all  whose  hearts  are  not  com- 
pletely hardened,  when  their  feelings  flow  forth  spontaneously 
towards  the  God  or  the  Gods  whom  they  have  been  taught  to 
worship.  When  some  lovely  landscape  kindles  the  eye  and  ex- 
pands the  breast,  and  calls  forth  trains  of  thought  which  run 
towards  all  that  is  beautiful  and  grand,  there  are  yet  deeper  feel- 
ings which  will  prompt  them  to  raise  their  anthem  of  praise  with 
that  which  ascends  from  the  works  of  God  around.  When  un 
expected  blessings  are  conferred,  when  a  friend  long  absent  sud- 
denly returns,  when  a  relative  who  has  struggled  for  a  time  with 
the  billows  of  death  is  restored  to  the  bosom  of  his  rejoicing 
family,  when  some  stroke  of  adversity  is  stayed  at  the  moment  of 
descent,  when  the  storm  which  threatened  to  overwhelm  us  is 
suddenly  calmed, — it  is  the  native  impulse  of  the  human  mind  to 
pour  forth  its  sentiments,  too  spiritual  for  human  language  to 
utter  them,  or  human  ear  to  understand  them,  into  the  ear  of  a 
listening  God,  to  whom  they  are  due,  and  who  can  comprehend 
them  all.  More  frequently — such  is  the  nature  of  the  human 
mind — it  is  when  the  storm  rises,  or  when  wearied  of  the  voyage, 
or  when  rest  might  be  pleasant  after  labor,  that  the  mind  pictures 
a  haven  of  rest  to  which  it  would  betake  itself  in  the  presence  of 
God.  Or  it  is  when  clouds  are  gathering  around,  when  gaunt 
poverty  is  in  hard  pursuit,  when  friends  die  or  forsake  us.  when 
the  last  star  of  hope  in  the  firmament  is  quenched  in  darkness — 
we  are  brought  to  our  knees  by  the  weight  of  our  cares,  and  find 
no  outlet  to  our  feelings  so  suitable  as  the  language  of  devotion 


THE    DISTANCE    ON    MAN    FfcOM    GOD.  53 

and  prayer.  More  powerful  still,  if  not  more  frequent,  it  is  a 
sense  of  sin  and  a  fear  of  deserved  punishment;  it  is  the  first  mo- 
ment's reflection  after  passion  has  hurried  us  into  the  commis- 
sion of  some  criminal  deed  which  cannot  be  undone  ;  it  is  the 
resurrection  of  some  sin  buried  in  oblivion,  but  now  rising  to  haunt 
us  like  the  ghost  of  a  departed  foe;  it  is  the  vivid  flash  of 
lightning,  such  as  the  conscience  sometimes  emits,  giving  us  a 
view  of  overhanging  darkness  and  clouds  charged  with  judg- 
ments :  These  are  the  feelings  which  constrain  men  to  cry  out  to 
God,  to  deprecate  deserved  wrath,  and  supplicate  undeserved 
mercy. 

Such  is  the  attracting  principle — and  we  do  not  wonder  that 
there  should  be  a  principle  attracting  man  to  his  Maker  ]  but 
there  is  also  a  repelling  principle,  and  it 'is  the  latter  which  is  so 
very  mysterious.  It  is  a  fact — and  the  explanation  is  to  be 
found  in  an  evil  conscience — that  there  is  something  in  human 
nature  which  would  drive  man  away  from  his  Maker.  When 
his  better  feelings  would  prompt  him  to  fail  down  before  God,  a 
hand  from  behind  is  felt  to  be  holding  him  back,  and  he  hesitates 
and  procrastinates  till  the  time  for  action  is  over.  Thus,  when 
nature  is  displaying  its  loveliest  scenes,  he  would  be  inclined  to 
look  to  that  Light  in  the  heavens  whose  beams  gladden  them  all ; 
but  the  eye  is  blinded  by  its  excess  of  purity,  and  turns  back  in- 
stantly to  the  less  dazzling  landscapes  of  the  earth.  In  the  hour 
of  adversity  the  desponding  feelings  which,  for  the  health  of  the 
soul,  should  be  allowed  to  flow  out  towards  God,  are  repressed 
and  bound  up  from  ail  inspection,  and  they  fester  within  till  they 
pollute  the  heart  and  rankle  the  temper,  and  burst  out  in  misery 
and  crime.  Still  more  frequently,  in  order  to  check  his  melan- 
choly, and  rouse  his  morbid  feelings,  the  man  runs  round  the  gay 
and  giddy  circles  of  society,  and  tries  to  banish  grief  by  banish- 
ing reflection,  till  he  falls  in  the  very  feverishness  and  dizziness 
of  a  feeling  which  has  been  too  highly  excited.  More  melancholy 
still,  he  takes  the  cup  of  intoxication  into  his  hands,  and  seeks  to 
drown  his  cares  in  forgetfulness  ;  or  he  goes  to  the  dark  haunts 
of  vice,  and  hatches  passions  within  him,  the  bursting  whereof, 
produces  a  viper  spreading  everywhere  poison  and  death.  Again, 
when  the  conviction  of  sin  would  lay  him  in  lowly  penitence  before 
the  God  whom  he  has  offended,  he  betakes  himself  to  certain  out- 
ward acts  and  services,  which  may  stretch  the  strings  of  his  feel- 
ings till  the  vibrations  of  conscience  subside.  When  he  has 


54  PHENOMENA    COMMONLY    OVERLOOKED. 

fallen  into  vice,  and  when  a  sense  of  weakness  and  insufficiency? 
would  drive  him  for  help  to  the  power  of  the  Almighty,  he  is 
tempted  by  pride  to  collect  his  remaining  strength,  and  make  one: 
other  effort  to  save  his  sinking  virtue  ;  and  though  the  vessel, 
when  yet  entire,  could  not  bear  him  up,  but  was  broken  in  piece* 
by  the  dashing  of  the  waves  of  temptation  and  passion,  he  yet 
clings  to  some  feeble  fragment  of  it,  and  soon  feels  himself  sink- 
ing to  rise  no  more. 

Such  phenomena  demonstrate  that  there  is  an  alienation  from 
God  on  the  part  of  man.  The  nature  and  extent  of  this  aliena- 
tion may  be  more  fitly  investigated  at  a  future  stage  of  our  in- 
quiries ;  but  the  fact,  that  there  is  such  an  alienation  proceeding 
from  a  consciousness  of  sin,  cannot  be  disputed,  for  history  and 
experience  furnish  too  abundant  proof  of  its  existence.  Every 
man  feels  that,  while  it  is  natural  for  him  to  love  certain  earthly 
objects,  that  while  it  is  natural,  for  instance,  to  the  father  to  love 
his  child;  it  is  not  natural  to  man  to  love  God  as  he  ought  to  lov& 
him.  But  while  man  is  thus  driven  from  God  by  one  principle, 
there  is  something  within  which  at  the  very  time  is  testifying  in 
behalf  of  God.  "  Man/'  says  Vinet,  "  cannot  renounce  either  his 
sins  or  his  God."  There  is,  in  short,  a  conscience,  but  a  con- 
science unpacified,  a  conscience  telling  him  of  God,  but  urging 
him  to  flee  from  that  very  God  to  whom  it  directs  him. 

Hence  the  strange  contradictions  of  the  human  soul.  It  is 
drawn  to  God,  and  yet  it  is  repelled  from  God  when  it  comes  near 
him — as  the  electrified  ball  is  repelled  as  soon  as  it  comes  into  con- 
tact with  the  object  which  attracted  it.  Man  is  constrained  to 
acknowledge  God,  and  constrained  to  tremble  before  the  God 
whom  he  acknowledges.  He  would  escape  from  God,  only  to  feel 
that  he  is  chained  to  him  by  bonds  which  he  cannot  break.  He 
would  flee  from  God,  but  feels  himself  helpless  as  the  charmed 
bird  with  the  eye  of  the  serpent  fixed  upon  it.  He  would  go 
forth  like  Cain  from  the  presence  of  the  Lord,  but  he  has  God's 
mark  upon  him,  and  is  still  under  his  eye  in  all  his  wanderings. 
He  would  flee  from  the  presence  of  God  like  the  rebellious  pro- 
phet, into  a  region  of  thought  and  feeling,  where  the  remem- 
brance of  God  can  never  trouble  him  ;  but  it  is  only  to  find  him- 
self brought  back  by  restraints  laid  upon  him.  In  his  conduct 
towards  his  God,  there  is  prostration  and  yet  rebellion — there  is 
assurance,  and  yet  there  is  terror.  When  he  refuses  to  worship 
God,  it  is  from  mingled  pride  and  alarm  ;  and  when  he  worships 


THE    RELIGIOUS    HISTORY    OF    MANKIND.  55 

God,  it  is  from  the  same  feelings ;  and  the  worship  which  he 
spontaneously  pays  is  a  strange  mixture  of  presumption  and 
slavish  fear. 

Hence  the  vibrating  movements  of  the  world's  religious  history. 
Under  this  double  influence,  attractive  and  repulsive,  man's  eccen- 
tric orbit  is  not  so  much  like  that  of  the  planets,  with  their  equable 
motion  and  temperature,  as  like  that  of  the  comets  now  approach- 
ing, as  it  were,  within  the  scorching  beams  of  the  Central  Heat 
and  Light,  and  again  driven  away  into  the  utmost  and  coldest 
regions  of  space,  and  seeming  as  if  they  were  let  loose  from  all 
central  and  restraining  influence. 

Under  these  influences,  sometimes  clashing,  and  at  other  times 
concurring,  man  acts  in  one  or  other  of  two  ways ;  and  we  urge 
the  circumstance  as  at  once  a  proof  and  illustration  of  the  truth 
of  the  views  now  advanced.  He  concludes  that  God  is  taking  no 
notice  of  him,  and  he  follows  the  bent  of  his  own  inclinations ;  or 
in  the  dread  of  punishment,  he  betakes  himself  to  superstition,  to- 
idle  ceremonies  or  excruciating  sacrifices,  and  acts  of  will-worship, 
regarded  by  him  as  fitted  to  pacify  an  angry  God.  Some  give 
themselves  up  to  the  one,  and  some  to  the  other,  of  these  impulses  ; 
some  are  Sadducees,  and  others  are  Pharisees ;  some  are  Epicure- 
ans, and  others  are  Stoics ;  some  are  Infidels ;  and  others  are 
Devotees.  The  majority  of  mankind  flit  between  the  two,  between 
unbelief  and  superstition  ;  now  when  in  health,  giving  themselves 
to  the  wildness  of  the  one.  and  now  in  trouble,  clinging  to  the 
strictness  of  the  other,  and  generally  remaining  in  a  kind  of 
neutral  territory,  like  the  false  prophet's  coffin,  seeming  to  hang 
by  the  heavens,  but  truly  upon  the  earth.*  Mine.  De  Sevigne 
expresses,  with  her  usual  naivete,  the  feelings  of  multitudes, — "  I 
wish  very  much  I  could  be  religious.  I  plague  La  Mousse  about 
it  every  day.  I  belong  at  present  neither  to  God  nor  the  devil ; 
and  I  find  this  condition  very  uncomfortable,  though  between  you 
and  me  the  most  natural  in  the  world." 

ILLUSTRATIVE  NOTE  (A).— THE  RELIGIOUS  HISTORY  OF  MANKIND. 

Our  ordinary  philosophic  historians  have  utterly  failed  in  their 
attempts  to  explain  the  world's  history  so  far  as  it  relates  to  religion 

*  Hume  speaks  (Nat.  Hist,  of  Religion,  Sect.  12,)  of  man's  usual  religious  state  as 
"  some  unaccountable  operation  of  the  mind  between  disbelief  and  conviction."  We 
have  endeavored  to  give  an  explanation  of  this  state  by  principles,  which  Hume  was 
not  willing  to  look  at. 


56 


ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 


or  superstition,  because  they  have  not  taken  into  account  those 
principles  in  man's  nature  which  now  draw  him  towards  a  super- 
natural power,  and  again  drive  him  away  from  it.  Such  writers 
as  Montesquieu  and  Robertson  have  seen  other  causes,  physical  or 
moral,  but  have  left  this  one  very  much  out  of  view.  The  clever 
but  flippant  Voltaire  exhibited  the  repulsive  or  infidel  principle  in 
his  writings,  as  he  is  said  to  have  come  under  the  attractive  or 
superstitious  influence  at  his  dying  hour  •  but  it  was  not  to  be  ex- 
pected of  him  that  he  should  be  "able  to  detect  and  develop  those 
principles  of  which  he  was  the  unconscious  slave.  Some  of  our 
later  historical  speculators,  such  as  Guizot  and  Carlyle,  have  had 
occasional  glimpses  of  the  better  principle,  but  none  of  them  have 
sounded  the  full  depths  of  the  "  spirit's  mysteries,"  or  taken  suffi- 
ciently enlarged  views  of  both  principles,  the  better  and  the  worse, 
to  enable  them  to  explain  satisfactorily  the  most  startling  passages 
in  the  world's  history.  They  have  no  calculus  to  solve  so  high  a 
problem.  Such  writers  as  Hume  and  Gibbon,  feeling  all  common- 
place explanations  to  fail,  can  only  talk  of  man's  unaccountable 
madness  in  everything  which  relates  to  religion. 

These  two,  the  attracting  and  repelling  principle,  do  not,  as 
might  be  supposed,  nullify  or  destroy  each  other,  but  produce 
motion  and  powerful  action  like  the  attractions  and  repulsions  of 
electricity.  According  as  the  one  or  other  prevails,  according  as 
there  is  excess  or  defect,  there  is  motion  towards  God,  or  motion 
away  from  God — there  is  belief,  or  there  is  scepticism.  Some  of 
the  most  extraordinary  events  in  the  history  of  individuals,  of 
families,  and  of  nations,  are  to  be  explained  by  these  agencies. 
They  have  been  the  real  moving  power  in  the  production  of  events 
in  which  ordinary  observers  have  discovered  other  and  more  obvi- 
ous and  superficial  causes,  just  as  electricity  is  now  acknowledged 
to  be  the  cause  of  changes  in  physical  phenomena,  which  were 
before  referred  to  more  palpable  agents,  such  as  heat  and  light. 
The  sudden  changes  in  men's  religious  opinions,  and  the  religious 
movements  which  form  so  curious  and  melancholy  a  chapter  in 
the  world's  history,  can  only  be  understood  by  the  help  of  these 
deeper  principles,  just  as  the  changes  in  the  weather,  the  currents 
of  the  atmosphere,  and  the  gathering  and  scattering  of  the  clouds, 
»:an  be  expl  dined  only  by  the  attractions  and  repulsions  of  polar 
forces.  These  deeper  principles  of  our  nature  are  capable  of  pro- 
ducing results  of  the  most  appalling  magnitude.  The  winds  of 
feeling,  and  the  waves  of  passion,  and  the  fires  of  lust,  the  old 


THE    RELIGIOUS    HISTORY    OF    MANKIND.  57 

and  recognized  elements,  do  not  produce  greater  effects  upon  each 
other,  and  upon  the  more  earthly  ingredients  in  man's  nature, 
than  does  the  more  latent  power  that  derives  its  force  from  the  re- 
pelling and  attractive  power  of  conscience.  No  human  arithmetic 
can  estimate  the  velocity  with  which  this  current,  positive  or  nega- 
tive, will  rush  in  to  fill  the  vacuum  which  may  have  been  pro- 
duced iii  the  heart  of  an  individual  man,  when  the  worldly  hopes 
which  filled  it  have  been  torn  away,  or  in  the  heart  of  a  nation 
when  it  is  without  a  creed,  or  when  its  creed  has  become  obsolete, 
and  is  felt  to  be  indefensible.  The  lurid  lightning  does  not  pro- 
duce a  more  rapid  effect  in  the  physical  world,  nor  does  the 
accompanying  thunder  raise  a  deeper  feeling  of  awe,  than  the 
religious  impulse  has  done  at  some  periods,  and  the  hatred  of  re- 
ligion has  done  at  other  periods,  in  the  history  of  the  world. 

It  is  thus  that  we  are  to  account  for  the  powerful  impulse  which 
religion,  or  the  hatred  of  religion,  has  given  to  the  minds  of  indi- 
vidual men  and  of  nations.  Hence  the  frenzy — hence  the  bigotry 
of  infidelity.  Hence,  too,  the  frenzy — hence  the  bigotry  of  super- 
stition. Hence  we  find  men  now  mad  upon  their  idols,  and  now 
mad  against  them — now  honoring,  and  anon  beating  them. 
The  ancient  Egyptians,  in  times  of  severe  national  distress,  took 
their  sacred  animals  to  a -secret  place  and  put  them  to  death;  and 
threatened  their  gods,  that  if  the  calamity  did  not  pass  away, 
they  would  disclose  the  mysteries  of  Isis,  or  expose  the  members 
of  Osiris  to  Typhon.  Augustus  revenged  himself  for  the  loss  of 
his  fleet  by  storms  on  two  several  occasions,  by  forbi'ddiug  the 
statue  of  Neptune  to  be  carried  in  the  procession  of  the  gods. 
"  These  men  fear  the  gods,"  says  Plutarch,  "  and  fly  to  them  for 
succor.  They  flatter  them,  and  insult  them.  They  pray  to  them, 
and  complain  of  them."  These  impulses  have  at  times  been 
stronger  than  the  strongest  of  human  instincts  and  affections,  than 
the  love  of  parents  for  their  children,  or  the  love  of  life.  Mothers 
have  made  their  children  to  pass  through  the  fu-e;  and  devotees 
have  mangled  their  own  bodies,  or  thrown  themselves  before  the 
car  of  Juggernaut.  The  results  that  have  followed  from  the  abuse 
of  this  sentiment  have  been  as  stupendous  and  melancholy  as  any 
that  have  followed  from  the  bursting  out  of  the  human  passions. 
One  hundred  and  thirty-six  thousand  human  skulls  were  counted 
in  a  particular  temple  in  Mexico;  and  it  is  calculated,  that  for  a 
period  of  200  years,  there  had  been  an  average  of  680  murders  in 
honor  of  a  single  idol.  Other  events  show,  that  enmity  to  God 


58 


ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 


has  produced  consequences  no  less  lamentable.  The  history  of 
the  Jews,  at  the  fall  of  Jerusalem,  does  not  more  strikingly  illus- 
trate the  strength  of  the  one  principle,  than  the  counterpart  history 
of  Paris,  at  the  time  of  the  first  Revolution,  demonstrates  the  force 
of  the  other  principle,  when  men,  as  Burke  says,  "  hate  God  with 
all  their  heart,  with  all  their  mind,  with  all  their  soul,  and  with 
all  their  strength."  The  whole  passage  is  worthy  of  being  quoted, 
as  descriptive  of  the  strength  of*  a  principle,  of  the  nature  of 
which,  however,  Burke  had  nothing  but  imperfect  glimpses. 
"The  rebels  to  God  perfectly  abhor  the  author  of  their  being; 
they  hate  him  with  all  their  mind,  with  all  their  soul,  and  with 
all  their  strength.  He  never  presents  himself  to  their  thoughts, 
but  to  menace  and  alarm  them.  They  cannot  strike  the  sun  out 
of  the  heavens,  but  they  are  able  to  raise  a  smouldering  smoke 
that  obscures  him  from  their  own  eyes.  Not  being  able  to  revenge 
themselves  on  God,  they  have  a  delight  in  vicariously  defacing, 
degrading,  torturing,  and  tearing  to  pieces  his  image  in  man.  Let 
no  one  judge  of  them  by  what  he  has  conceived  of  them,  when 
they  were  not  incorporated  and  had  no  lead.  They  were  then 
only  passengers  in  a  common  vehicle.  They  were  then  carried 
along  with  the  general  motion  of  religion  in  the  community  ; 
and  without  being  aware  of  it,  partook  of  its  influence.  In 
that  relation,  at  worst,  their  nature  was  left  free  to  counterwork 
their  principles.  [Burke  should  have  said,  one  part  of  their  nature 
restrained  another.]  They  despaired  of  giving  any  very  general 
currency  to  their  opinions.  They  considered  them  a  reserved 
privilege  for  the  chosen  few.  But  when  the  possibility  of  domin- 
ion, lead,  and  propagation  presented  themselves,  and  they  saw 
that  the  ambition  which  before  made  them  hypocrites  might 
rather  gain  than  lose  by  a  daring  avowal  of  their  sentiments,  then 
the  nature  of  this  infernal  spirit,  which  has  evil  for  its  good,  ap- 
peared in  its  full  perfection.  Nothing  indeed  hut  the  possession  of 
some  power  can,  with  any  certainty,  discover  what  at  the  bottom 
is  the  true  character  of  any  man."  * 

Such  phenomena  as  these,  whether  connected  with  superstition 
or  infidelity,  have  baffled  all  ordinary  historical  philosophers,  or 
philosophic  historians,  to  account  for  them.  After  we  have  read 
all  that  they  can  say  about  human  madness  and  human  passion 
— about  pride,  vanity,  and  malice — we  feel  as  if  they  had  merely 
explained  some  of  the  accompaniments  of  these  great  movements  j 
*  Burlje's  Regicide  Peace. 


THE    RELIGIOUS    HISTORY    OF    MANKIND.  &9 

and  shown  why  the  stream  took  a  particular  direction,  but  without 
at  all  observing  the  stream  itself,  which  leaps  up  from  one  of  the 
profoundest  depths  oftthe  human  heart,  and  needs  from  the  other 
powers  arid  propensities  only  a  channel  to  flow  in. 

The  more  popular  of  the  false  religions  which  have  spread 
themselves  over  the  world — the  superstitions  of  the  East,  of  ancient 
Greece  and  Rome,  of  Mohammed,  and  of  the  corrupt  Christian 
Church— have  all  given  the  most  ample  scope  to  these  impulses 
in  our  nature,  and  to  some  of  the  worst  passions  in  the  human 
heart  besides.  What  a  strange  compound,  yet  banded  firmly  to- 
gether, of  licentiousness,  and  yet  of  rigidity,  of  loose  morality,  and 
of  unbending  ritual.  No  system  of  superstition  will  be  extensively 
adopted  unless  it  provides  for  these  opposing  wants  of  our  nature, 
unless  it  gives  open  or  secret  license  to  wildness,  and  allows  room 
or  finds  employment  for  remorse.  The  two  peculiar  features  of 
man's  existing  condition,  are  evil  passions  and  an  evil  conscience. 
No  superstition  can  become  popular  which  does  not  provide  or  ad- 
mit something  to  meet  the  craving  demands  of  both.  Hence  the 
grossness  of  Paganism,  with  its  horrid  and  cruel  sacrifices :  witness 
the  licentiousness  and  the  tortures  practised  around  the  same  In- 
dian temple.  Bacchus  and  Venus  are  to  be  found  in  the  same 
mythologies  with  Baal  and  Pluto,  and  under  various  names,  and 
with  lesser  individual  differences,  have  been  worshipped  over  the 
larger  portion  of  the  Pagan  world.  Even  in  Rome,  which  professed 
an  abhorrence  of  the  levity  of  the  Greeks,  there  were,  according  to 
Valerius  Maxim  us,  so  many  as  7000  bacchanals,  among  whose 
mysteries  both  prostitution  and  murder  occupied  an  important 
place.  Hence  the  love  of  war,  with  the  stringent  formularies  that 
distinguished  Mohammedanism  in  the  days  of  its  youth  and 
vigor.  The  apostate  Christian  Church  seems  to  unite  in  itself 
all  the  elements  found  separately  in  every  other  superstition,  and 
to  be  Catholic  and  all-embracing,  not  in  its  truths,  but  in  its  errors. 
We  agree  with  De  Maistre  in  thinking  that  "  there  is  not  a  dog- 
ma in  the  Catholic  Church,  nor  even  a  general  custom  belonging 
to  the  high  discipline,  which  has  not  its  roots  in  the  extreme 
depths  of  human  nature,  and  consequently  in  some  general  opin- 
ion more  or  less  altered  here  and  there,  but  common  in  its  princi- 
ples to  all  nations."  *  In  the  bosom  of  that  Church  there  have 
been  embraced  at  the  same  instant  unbridled  scepticism  and  profl* 
gacy,  grasping  ambition,  and  the  most  profound  deceit,  with  the 

*  Du  Pape. 


60  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

asceticism  of  the  anchorite,  and  the  blind  faith  of  the  devotee. 
These  things  may  seem  inconsistent,  and  so  they  are ;  but  their 
inconsistency  is  to  be  found  in  human  nature,  the  character  of 
which  they  exhibit,  as  the  unwholesome  food  which  the  diseased 
stomach  demands  points  out  the  nature  and  craving  power  of  the 
malady  with  which  it  is  afflicted. 

When  a  religion  waxes  old  in  a  country — when  the  circumstan- 
ces which  at  first  favored    its   formation  or    introduction    have 
changed — when  in  an  age  of  reason  it  is  tried  and  found  unreason- 
able— when  in  an  age  of  learning  it  is  discovered  to  be* the  product 
of  ^he  grossest  ignorance — when  in  an  age  of  levity  it  is  felt  to  be 
too  stern, — then  the  infidel  spirit  takes  courage,  and  with  a  zeal 
in  which  there  is  a  strange  mixture  of  scowling  revenge  and  light- 
hearted  wantonness,  of  deep-set  hatred   and  laughing   levity,   it 
proceeds 'to  level  all  existing  temples  and  altars,  and  erects  no 
others   in   their    room.       "The   popular   religions  of    antiquity,' 
says  Neander,    "answered  only  for  a  certain  stage  of  culture. 
When  the  nations  in  the  course  of   their  progress  had  passed 
beyond  this,  the  necessary  consequence  was  a  dissevering  of  the 
spirit  from  the  religious  traditions.     In  the  case  of  the  more  quiet 
and  equable  development  of  the  Oriental  mind,  so  tenacious  of 
the  old,  the  opposition  between  the  mythic  religion  of  the  people 
and  the  secret  theosophic  doctrines  of  a  priestly  caste,  who  gave 
direction  to  the  popular  conscience,  might  exist  for  centuries  with- 
out change.     But  among  the  more  excitable  nations  of  the  west, 
intellectual  culture,  so  soon  as  it  attained  to  a  certain  degree  of 
independence,  must  fall  into  collision  with  the  mythic  religion 
handed  down  from  the  infancy  of  the  people."     "  As  early  as  the 
fifth  and  fourth  centuries  before  Christ,  the  arbitrary  and  heartless 
dialectic  of  the  sophists  was  directed  against  the  might  of  holy 
tradition  and  morals."  *     Celsus  may  be  taken  as  the  representa- 
tive of  the  infidel  principle  when  Christianity  was  introduced. 
Possessed  of  "  wit  and  acuteness,  without  earnest  purpose  or  depth 
of  research,  and  with  a  worldly  understanding  that  glances  merely 
at  the  surface,  and  delights  in  hunting  up  difficulties  and  contra- 
dictions,"   he  opposes    superstition,  not  because  of  his  love  for 
religion,  but  because  of  his  hatred  to  all  religion ;  and  hence  is 
jpund  opposing  both  superstition  and  the  true  religion,  with  only 
this  difference,  that  while  he  laughs  at  the  popular  mythologies, 
he  gets  angry  at  Christianity. 

*  General  Church  History — Introduction. 


THE    RELIGIOUS    HISTORY    OF    MANKIND.  61 

When  Popery  was  waning  in  Prance  in  the  days  of  Louis 
XIV.,  wheir  the  lives  of  the  clergy  brought  reproach  on  religion, 
and  its  superstitions  could  not  stand  the  sifting  light  of  modern 
science — then  infidelity,  long  lurking,  as  it  ever  lurks,  in  the  midst 
of  superstition,  found  vent  in  those  sneers  which  are  ever  the  ap- 
propriate and  true  expression  of  scepticism,  expressive  at  once  of 
its  wantonness  and  deep  malignity.  In  the  present  day  the  super- 
stitions of  India,  in  which  theology  and  cosmogony  are  so  closely 
intertwined  that  they  must  stand  or  fall  together,  are  being  under- 
mined among  the  higher  classes  by  the  advancement  of  European 
science.  One  look  through  the  telescope  dispels  all  the  illusions 
of  the  Brahminical  faith,  and  blots  out  of  existence  as  many 
myriads  of  gods,  as  it  brings  into  view  myriads  of  stars  reflecting 
the  glory  of  the  one  living  and  true  God.  The  result  is  a  widen- 
ing scepticism  among  the  Hindoos  of  the  higher  castes. 

But  a  nation  cannot  be  long  without  a  religion.  There  are 
times  in  every  man's  history  when  he  feels  that  he  needs  to  be 
strengthened  by  faith  in  a  higher  power ;  and  mankind  generally 
will  never  consent  systematically  to  cut  the  last  tie  that  connects 
them  with  heaven.  The  attracting  principle  must  operate ;  and 
being  a  universally  active  and  powerful  principle,  it  insists  on  a 
creed  and  religious  worship  as  its  appropriate  expression. 

Human  sagacity  cannot  predict  what  building  may  be  raised 
on  the  ruins  of  ancient  superstitions,  among  the  half-civilized 
nations  of  the  East;  but  it  can  certainly  foretell,  proceeding  on 
the  known  principles  of  the  human  mind,  that  when  infidelity  has 
advanced  a  little  farther  with  its  work  of  devastation,  nature, 
which  abhors  a  vacuum,  will  demand  something  positive  to  fill  up 
the  void.  If  scriptural  truth  does  not  pre-occupy  the  ground,  it 
may  be  feared  that  the  superstition  which  grew  so  vigorously  on 
the  debris  of  fallen  empires  in  the  middle  ages  of  Europe,  and 
which  has  been  transplanted  into  the  rich  but  wild  soil  of  South 
America,  and  of  not  a  few  of  the  British  colonies,  may  yet  find 
its  seeds  taking  congenial  root  in  the  heaving  plains  on  which 
the  superstitions  of  India  and  China  are  soon  to  decay. 

W^  know  what  has  taken  place  in  France.  The  infidel  prin- 
ciple wrought  its  appropriate  work  of  destruction  at  the  first  Revo- 
lution^ The  opposite  principle  then  rushed  in  once  more  to  fill  up 
the  void.  Napoleon  Bonaparte  perceived  that  a  new  and  vigorous 
crop  must  spring  up  from  the  old  and  indestructible  principles 
which  have  tneir  roots  deep  down  in  the  human  heart ;  and  that 


B2  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE 

Ihe  lean  and  haggard  ears  which  infidelity  had  raised  up  were  be- 
coming thinner  and  weaker,  and  must  needs  die.  He  reasoned 
from  what  he  had  experienced  in  his  own  breast  more  than  from 
observation,  and  his  reasoning  had  therefore  the  firmer  foundation 
lo  rest  on.  M.  Thiers,  in  whom  the  conqueror  has  found  a  befit- 
ting historian — the  one  being  as  clever  and  as  unprincipled,  too> 
as  the  other — has  furnished  us  with  a  deeply  interesting  description 
of  this  singular  passage  in  his  history.  "For  my  part,"  said 
Bonaparte,  when  at  Malmaison,  "I  never  heard  the  sound  of  the 
church-bell  in  the  neighbouring  village  without  emotion."  The 
proposal  to  restore  the  Catholic  religion  was  listened  to  with  scorn 
by  those  savans  of  Paris,  who  had  all  their  days  been  inveterately 
opposed  to  religion.  They  scowled  upon  and  ridiculed  the  pro- 
posal— declared  it  was  weakness  in  him  to  submit  to  superstition 
which  had  forever  passed  away ;  that  he  Deeded  iw  sucli  Aid  to 
government,  and  that  he  might  do  what  he  pleased^  "Yes,"  says 
he,  "but  only  with  regard  to  the  real  and  sensibly  felt  wants  of 
Prance."  The  real  and  sensibly  felt  wants  which  he  felt  himself, 
and  which  the  nation  felt,  were  the  craving  for  religious  belief  and 
worship  suitable  to  their  particular  desires,  and  fitted  to  meet  and 
gratify  them.  The  events  which  followed  the  resolution  taken  by 
Bonaparte — the  negotiations  with  the  Pope,  and  the  setting  up  of 
the  Romish  worship,  and  the  general  enthusiasm  of  the  nation — 
all  show  how  deeply  planted  and  how  strong  is  the  religious 
affection  in  the  human  heart.  "Whether  true  or  false,  sublime 
or  ridiculous,"  is  the  reflection  of  the  historian,  "man  must  have 
a  religion.  Everywhere,  in  all  ages,  in  all  countries,  in  ancient 
as  in  modern  times,  in  civilized  as  well  as  in  barbarian  nations,  we 
find  him  a  worshipper  at  some  altar,  be  it  venerable,  degraded,  or 
blood-stained."  * 

Infidelity,  like  religion,  has  existed  in  all  countries,  and  origi- 
nates in  that  deep  impulse  which  drives  man  away  from  God. 
But  it  cannot  be  the  prevailing  state  of  mind  in  a  nation  for  any 
length  of  time.  The  reason  is  obvious.  Both  the  principles  to 
which  we  have  referred  as  existing  in  the  mind  must  operate, 
Neither  can  be  destroyed,  and  both  are  in  their  nature  active. 
But  the  infidel  principle  can  exist  and  flourish  in  the  very  midsi 
of  reigning  superstition.  It  derives  its  strongest  nourishment 
from  the  rank  and  foul  superstition  fermenting  around  it.  It 
points  to  the  folly  of  the  ignorant  or  deluded  devotee  with  a  sneer, 
*  Thiers,  Con.  and  Empire. 


THE    RELIGIOUS    HISTORY    OP    MANKIND.  63 

and  congratulates  itself  on  its  own  superiority.  Except  when 
dreadfully  rankled  and  reproached,  it  is  not  disposed  to  make  any 
sacrifices  for  its  principles,  or  rather  want  of  principle.  Harassed 
by  internal  fears,  it  is  at  heart  cowardly,  even  when  it  must  seem 
courageous,  Coleridge  says  of  blasphemy,  that  "  he  uttered  big 
words,  and  yet  ever  and  anon  I  observed  that  he  turned  pale 
at  his  own  courage."  Except  at  those  times  when,  as  Burke 
says,  it  longs  for  domination,  it  can  be  quiet,  and  timid,  and  time- 
serving, and  securely  cloak  itself  under  the  old  distinction  of 
esoteric  doctrine  for  the  knowing  few,  and  an  exoteric  doctrine  for 
the  vulgar. 

But  the  religious  or  superstitious  principle  cannot  willingly 
allow  its  opposite  to  reign  or  prevail.  A  negation  can  exist 
anywhere;  it  is  slippery,  easy,  and  accommodating;  but  that 
which  is  positive  must  have  space  and  room,  and  it  would  drive 
out  that  which  resists  it.  Hence  the  religious  principle,  as  being 
the  active,  the  undaunted,  the  unaccommodating,  (or  if  you  will,) 
the  aggressive  principle,  must,  in  ordinary  circumstances,  be  the 
predominant  one. 

Infidelity  soon  learns  that  it  is  its  easiest  policy,  not  openly  to 
withstand  the  popular  religion  and  so  raise  its  enthusiasm,  but 
rather  quietly  to  insinuate  itself  like  a  liquid  through  certain  ap- 
propriate veins  and  channels  of  the  body  corporate,  till  it  has 
soaked  the  whole  in  its  own  coldness  and  dampness.  Hence  re- 
ligion is  bold,  uncompromising,  and  resolute,  either  reigning  or 
seeking  to  reign ;  while  infidelity,  as  seen  for  instance  in  Hume, 
Gibbon,  and  the  Neologicai  critics  of  Germany,  and  the  modern 
school  of  Pantheists,  is  cowering  and  cunning  ;  dealing  much  in 
inuendo  and  insinuation  ;  generally  walking  with  soft  and 
stealthy  steps,  satisfied  with  freedom  from  restraint,  and  its  quiet 
indulgences ;  and  fearing  nothing  so  much  as  an  earnest  and 
pure  religion  disturbing  its  complacency,  and  making  it  doubt  of 
its  own  doubts.  The  historians  referred  to  can  tolerate  the 
grossest  superstition ;  the  one  can  excuse  Popery,  and  the  other 
apologize  for  the  most  licentious  Paganism  ;  and  their  wrath  is 
stirred  up,  only  when  a  pure  religion  is  exhibited  in  the  lives  of 
the  Puritans  of  the  17th  century,  or  of  the  primitive  Christians. 

It  cannot  be  doubted,  we  think,  that  the  prevalence  of  infidelity 
in  France  was  promoted  and  hastened  by  the  warm  sentimentalisni 
of  Rousseau,  more  than  even  by  the  clever  expositions  and  ridi- 
cule of  Voltaire.  In  the  writings  of  the  latter,  infidelity  is  ex- 


64  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

hibited  too  much  in  its  leanness  and  nakedness  to  attract  the 
heart  towards  it.  The  sceptical  principle,  no  doubt,  is  gratified. 
and  gloats  over  his  pages ;  but  the  opposite  principle  rebels,  and 
swells  up  in  a  regurgitation  of  feeling.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
religious  principle  is  deceived,  at  least  for  a  time,  by  the  gorgeous 
drapery  of  sentiment,  underneath  which  Rousseau  hides  the  hid- 
eous skeleton  of  infidelity.  His  sentimental  faith  and  doctrinal 
scepticism  served  for  a  time  to  satisfy  the  deeper  cravings  of  the 
human  heart.  But  the  mask,  a  thin  one  after  all,  was  soon  strip- 
ped off.  If  Voltaire  set  the  conscience  against  the  intellect,  Rous- 
seau's writings  set  the  intellect  against  the  heart ;  and  the  contest 
was  painful  to  those  who  did  not  wish  to  be  disturbed  by  an  inter- 
nal schism.  The  struggle  was,  as  it  were,  embodied  and  acted  in 
the  unseemly  contest  between  Hume  and  Rousseau.  The  mind 
of  France,  torn  for  a  time,  soon  demanded  something  more  con- 
sistent;  and  this  it  found  in  the  Genie  du  Christianisme ;  and 
the  nation,  converted  to  infidelity  by  Rousseau,  was  reconverted 
to  superstition  by  Chateaubriand.  The  writings  of  the  latter 
have  many  of  the  same  elements  of  power  as  the  former,  and  both 
address  the  two  opposing  feelings  of  man's  religious  nature. 
There  are  passages  of  Chateaubriand,  and  more  particularly  of 
his  quondam  disciple  Lamartine,  which  show,  that  amidst  su- 
perabounding  faith  of  sentiment,  there  is  a  great  deficiency  of 
faith  in  truth ;  and  while  there  is  sufficient  glowing  enthusiasm 
to  satisfy  the  cravings  of  natural  religion,  there  is  yet  enough  of 
latitude  of  doctrine  to  allow  of  the  free  working  of  pride  and  self- 
righteousness. 

Pantheism  is  the  form  in  which  infidelity  prevails  on  the  conti- 
nent of  Europe  in  the  present  day ;  and  by  its  illusions,  it  satisfies 
many  of  those  appetencies  of  the  mind  which  would  shrink  from 
gaunt  and  grim  Atheism.  It  pictures  a  fantasy  with  which  the 
imagination  may  hold  communion,  and  not  of  such  a  holy  bright- 
ness as  to  drive  back  the  spirit  with  oppressive  sense  of  demerit. 
Indeed,  sin  can  be  regarded  as  no  barrier  in  the  way  of  inter- 
course with  the  divinity  of  this  system,  for  the  evil  is  just  one  of 
his  own  developments.  Ample  and  accommodating,  it  professes 
to  embrace  within  it  all  religions,  and  actually  embraces  all  dead 
religions  ;  and  like  the  ancient  Roman  superstition  of  the  days  of 
the  emperors,  it  is  tolerant  of  all  religions,  always  excepting  a 
living  and  uncompromising  scriptural  religion  which  refuses  to 
enter  into  alliance  with  it:  just  as  the  emperors  erected  temples 


SCHISM    IN    THE    HUMAN    SOUL.  65 

to  the  grim  divinities  of  Egypt  and  of  the  other  nations  that  they 
conquered,  and  yet  virulently  persecuted  the  Christians.  Its  fan- 
tasies may  delude  for  a  time  the  minds  of  the  rich,  the  idle,  and 
the  refined  ;  but  meanwhile  there  will  be  a  feeling  of  emptiness 
and  want  in  the  depths  of  their  bosoms  ;  and  the  great  mass  of 
practical  men  will  scorn  the  delusion  which  would  be  practised 
upon  them,  and  rush  to  a  real  infidelity  or  a  real  superstition, 
recollecting  only  one  lesson  learned  in  the  school  of  Pantheism, 
and  that  is  a  fatal  habit  of  excusing  moral  evil  as  a  step  towards 
good,  or  a  necessary  part  of  a  beneficent  development. 

Looking  to  the  present  state  of  the  Continent  of  Europe,  it 
might  seem  as  if  infidelity,  under  its  various  forms,  were  for  a 
time  to  be  predominant.  France  is  not  now  the  only  nation  in 
which  it  has  taken  possession  of  the  thinking  minds,  which  are 
always  the  most  influential  minds ;  it  prevails  to  a  greater  or  less 
extent  in  the  majority  of  the  Continental  countries.  If  less  san- 
guine and  buoyant,  if  less  confident  and  bold,  than  immediately 
before  the  first  French  Revolution,  it  is  more  cautious  and  calcu- 
lating, for  it  has  learned  some  prudence  and  policy  from  its  re- 
verses. Working  silently,  and  under  cover  of  a  respect  for  all 
religions  as  alike  true,  that  is,  alike  false,  it  is  working  all  the 
more  surely :  and  its  scattered  forces  will  at  length  come  to  a 
head,  and  it  will  openly  proclaim  itself,  and  enter  upon  the  death 
struggle  for  which  it  is  preparing.  But  whatever  be  its  temporary 
triumphs,  it  cannot  be  permanently  successful.  The  ancient  su- 
perstition of  Europe,  containing  as  it  does  the  strength  of  the 
large  portion  of  truth  which  it  embraces,  and  all  the  strength  of 
corrupt  human  nature  besides,  will  be  found  more  than  a  match 
for  it.  and  will  come  forth  from  victory  with  a  bolder  front,  and 
claiming  a  more  formidable  authority.  Is  it  in  the  midst  of  these 
contests  that  the  truth  of  heaven,  by  the  immediate  interposition 
of  God,  is  to  shine  upon  odi  earth,  and  scatter  all  error  by  the 
brightness  of  its  rising? 


SECTION  VL— SCHISM  IN  THE  HUMAN  SOUL. 

Man  is  not  only  not  at  peace  with  God,  strange  and  paradoxi- 
cal as  the  language  may  sound,  he  is  not  even  at  peace  with 
himself.  There  is  a  schism  in  the  very  soul  itself. 

Two  facts  here  present  themselves — the  one,  that  man,  by  the 
very  constitution  of  his  mind,  approves  of  moral  good,  and  disap- 

5 


66  SCHISM    IN    THE    HUMAN    SOUL. 

proves  of  moral  evil ;  and  the  other,  that  he  neglects  the  good  and 
commits  the  evil.  We  reckon  these  two  facts  to  be  established  as 
clearly  as  any  that  can  fall  under  the  cognizance  of  the  human 
consciousness  ;  and  we  must  ever  hold  that  the  evidence  supplied 
by  the  internal  consciousness  is,  to  say  the  least  of  it,  as  certain 
and  immediate  as  that  of  the  senses. 

On  the  one  hand,  man  is  possessed  of  certain  moral  qualities. 
We  may  have  our  own  individual  opinion  as  to  the  psychological 
nature  of  these  qualities.  But  for  the  purpose  at  present  in  view 
we  care  not  how  they  be  explained,  whether  they  be  described  as 
belonging  to  the  intellectual  or  emotional  part  of  man's  nature, 
whether,  with  Butler,  we  hold  the  conscience  to  be  simple  and  in- 
divisible, or  regard  it,  with  Sir  James  Mackintosh,  as  the  neces- 
sary result  of  certain  other  operations  of  the  human  mind.  Dr. 
Chalmers  very  justly  compares  the  disputes,  in  regard  to  the  ori- 
gin or  structure  of  the  conscience,  to  an  antiquarian  controversy 
respecting  the  first  formation  and  subsequent  changes  of  some 
court  of  government,  the  rightful  authority  of  whose  decisions 
and  acts  is  at  the  same  time  fully  recognized.  This  moral  nature 
of  man  is  as  essential  to  him  as  any  of  his  other  properties.  The 
evidence  of  its  existence  is  so  full  that  we  would  as  soon  believe 
that  man  has  no  such  faculty  as  the  judgment,  or  that  he  has  no 
emotional  nature,  as  that  he  is  without  a  conscience.  Now,  this 
conscience  tells  him,  and  that,  too,  in  spite  of  the  sophisms  of  the 
understanding  when  it  happens  to  be  perverted,  or  of  the  pleading's 
of  the  passions  when  they  are  bent  upon  indulgence,  that  there 
is  an  indelible  distinction  between  good  and  evil,  and  points  to  a 
Power  upholding  this  distinction  in  the  government  of  the  universe. 

But,  on  the  other  hand,  these  fundamental  and  indestructible 
principles  in  the  human  soul  can  be  made  to  condemn  the  posses- 
sor. Ethical  writers  may  overlook  the  fact,  but  they  cannot  deny 
it  when  the  question  is  put  to  them.  Mankind  in  general  may 
be  inclined  to  avoid  the  subject  as  a  painful  one,  but  it  requires 
only  to  be  brought  under  their  notice  in  order  to  command  their 
assent.  Nay,  we  believe  that  they  are  laboring  perpetually  under 
a  secret  consciousness  of  such  a  contradiction  in  their  nature,  and 
that  their  instinctive  avoidance  of  all  allusion  to  it  arises  from  this 
very  cause.  They  shrink  from  it  as  from  a  fearful  secret,  as  we 
have  found  persons  shrinking  from  the  least  allusion  to  a  hidden 
humiliating  disease  or  bodily  deformity  in  their  persons,  or  to  cer- 
tain unfortunate  events  in  their  previous  life.  Certain  it  is,  that 


SCHISM    IN    THE    HUMAN    SOUL.  67 

when  his  conduct  is  brought  under  review,  man  is  condemned  by 
the  very  principles  in  his  own  bosom. 

Now,  the  wonderful  circumstance  is,  that  these  things  subsist 
together.  Tet,  here  they  are,  co-existing  in  the  same  breast,  and 
apparently  about  to  exist  there  forever,  and  without  an  adjust- 
ment ;  for  man  cannot  rid  himself  of  his  conscience  on  the  one 
hand,  nor  of  his  sins  on  the  other.  The  judge  is  seated  forever 
upon  his  throne,  and  the  prisoner  is  forever  at  his  bar,  and  there 
is  no  end  of  the  assize,  for  the  prisoner  is  ever  committing  new 
offences  to  call  forth  new  sentences  from  the  judge. 

The  double  truth,  which  explains  the  double  fact,  has  been 
grasped  by  Pascal,  and  developed  with  singular  conciseness  and 
beauty.  "  The  greatness  and  misery  of  man  being  alike  con- 
spicuous, religion  in  order  to  be  true  must  necessarily  teach  us 
that  he  has  in  himself  some  noble  principles  of  greatness^  and  at 
the  same  time  some  profound  source  of  misery.  For  true  religion 
cannot  answer  its  character,  otherwise  than  by  such  an  entire 
knowledge  of  our  nature,  as  perfectly  to  understand  all  that  is 
great  and  all  that  is  miserable  in  it,  together  with  the  reasons  of 
the  one  and  of  the  other."  "  The  philosophers  never  furnished 
men  with  sentiments  suitable  to  these  two  states.  They  incul- 
cated a  notion  either  of  absolute  grandeur  or  of  hopeless  degrada- 
tion, neither  of  which  is  the  true  condition  of  man.  From  the 
principles  which  I  develop,  you  may  discover  the  cause  of  those 
various  contrarieties  which  have  astonished  and  divided  mankind. 
Now,  then,  consider  all  the  great  and  glorious  aspirations  which 
the  sense  of  so  many  miseries  is  riot  able  to  extinguish,  and  in* 
quire  whether  they  can  proceed  from  any  other  cause  save  a 
higher  nature.  Had  man  never  fallen  he  would  have  enjoyed 
eternal  truth  and  happiness;  and  had  man  never  been  otherwise 
than  corrupt,  he  would  have  attained  no  idea  either  of  truth  or  hap- 
piness." "  So  manifest  is  it,  that  we  were  once  in  a  state  of  per- 
fection, from  which  we  are  now  unhappily  fallen."  "  It  is  aston- 
ishing that  the  mystery  which  is  farthest  removed  from  our 
knowledge  (I  mean  that  of  the  transmission  of  original  sin)  should 
vbe  that  without  which  we  can  have  no  knowledge  of  ourselves. 
It  is  in  this  abyss  that  the  clue  to  our  condition  takes  its  turns 
and  windings,  insomuch  that  man  is  more  incomprehensible 
without  this  mystery  than  this  mystery  is  incomprehensible  to 
man."* 

*  Pascal's  Thoughts. 


CHAPTER   III. 

THE  ACTUAL  WORLD,  AND  THE  VIEW  WHICH  IT  GIVES  OP 
ITS  GOVERNOR. 

SECTION  I— PARTICULAR   REVIEW  OF   THE  FIVE  PHENOMENA   BE- 
FORE SPECIFIED. 

THE  phenomena  which  we  have  been  considering  are  not 
small  and  insignificant,  nor  are  they  single  and  isolated ;  they 
are  large  in  themselves,  and  spread  over  the  wide  surface  of 
the  world,  and  the  world's  history.  They  are  not  mere  points 
on  which  a  perverted  ingenuity  may  construct  an  inverted 
pyramid,  but  a  wide  base  on  which  reason  may  rear  the  largest 
superstructure. 

They  are  phenomena  on  which  the  thinking  portion  of  man- 
kind have  been  prone  to  meditate  in  all  ages  and  countries,  and 
as  they  do  so,  have  often  become  bewildered,  and  have  lost  them- 
selves in  ever  thickening  mazes.  How  melancholy  the  language 
of  (lie  elder  Pliny  ! — "A  being  full  of  contradictions,  man  is  the 
most  wretched  of  creatures,  since  the  other  creatures  have  no 
wants  transcending  the  bounds  of  their  nature.  Man  is  full  of 
desires  and  wants  that  reach  to  infinity,  and  can  never  be  satis- 
fied. His  nature  is  a  lie,  uniting  the  greatest  poverty  with  the 
greatest  pride.  Among  these  so  great  evils,  the  best  thing  God 
has  bestowed  on  man  is  the  power  to  take  his  own  life."  Scep- 
tics have  se.en,  as  they  could  not  but  see,  these  darker  features  of 
our  world,  and  have  made  their  own  use  of  them.  They  have 
commonly  dwelt  among  these  mazes  as  robbers  live  in  dens,  and 
caves,  and  forests ;  and  thence  they  have  issued  to  plunder  all 
that  is  good,  to  waste  all  that  is  lovely,  and  to  allure  the  young 
and  adventurous  to  their  haunts,  in  the  hope  held  out  to  them  of 
freedom  from  all  restraint.  Strange  as  it  may  seem,  our  modern 
philosophers  have  generally  left  these  phenomena  very  much  out 
of  account  in  constructing  their  systems,  and  have  jostled  them  in 


FIVE    PHENOMENA    BEFORE    SPECIFIED.  69 

a  kind  of  separate  chapter  or  appendix,  in  which  they  treat  of 
objections  to  a  theory  already  formed. 

The  sceptic  has  revelled  in  this  field  as  the  raven  revels  in  cor- 
ruption. He  finds  a  kind  of  fiendish  delight  in  pointing  to  the 
apparent  oversights,  irregularities,  blunders,  and  crimes  in  the 
Divine  government.  The  Greek  sophists  toiled  in  this  work,  and 
rejoiced  in  the  doubt  and  confusion  which  they  introduced  into 
human  speculation.  Cotta,  the  academic  in  Cicero  de  natura 
deorum — representing  that  large  portion  of  the  learned  who  wish 
to  inquire  into  everything,  but  to  believe  as  little  as  possible,  who 
ask,  what  is  truth?  while  not  willing  to  wait  for  the  reply — 
fondly  dwells  on  the  misfortunes  and  sufferings  to  which  those 
supposed  to  be  good  are  so  often  exposed.  "  Why,  therefore,  did 
the  Carthaginians  oppress  in  Spain  the  two  Scipios,  among  the 
best  and  wisest  of  men  ?"  &c.  Volney,  in  wandering  over  the 
ruins  of  empires,  feels  a  pleasure  allied  to  that  of  the  conquerors 
who  battered  down  the  walls,  and  set  fire  to  the  houses  and 
temples  of  depopulated  cities  ;  he  seems  as  if  ridding  himself  of 
an  enemy  who  stood  in  his  way,  and  who  was  thwarting  the 
schemes  on  which  his  heart  was  set. 

Our  popular  writers  on  natural  religion  contemplate,  with  great 
interest,  a  particular  class  of  phenomena,  and  founding  on  them, 
they  demonstrate  that  God  is  a  being  of  infinite  benevolence. 
But  the  sceptic  appears,  and  points  to  another  order  of  facts, 
scarcely,  if  at  all,  less  numerous  and  momentous ;  and  insists, 
that  if  the  one  class  of  facts  proves  that  God  is  good,  the  other, 
on  the  very  same  principle,  proves  that  God  is  malevolent,  or  that 
he  takes  no  interest  in  the  world.  Placing  the  one  of  these  con- 
clusions over  against  the  other,  they  make  them,  like  antagonist 
forces,  destroy  each  other,  and  leave  nothing  but  a  blank  and 
universal  void.  But  instead  of  making  them  oppose  each  other, 
let  us  seek  to  combine  them.  We  may  agree  with  the  theolo- 
gians who  regard  them  as  not  contradictory,  but  we  disapprove 
of  their  method  of  looking  to  the  one  and  not  at  all  to  the  other, 
in  forming  their  ideas  of  the  Divine  character.  We  may  agree 
with  the  sceptic  in  insisting  that  the  apparent  irregularities  and 
disorders  to  be  found  in  the  world  should  be  taken  into  account, 
as  well  as  those  phenomena  which  specially  reflect  the  benevo- 
lence of  God ;  but  instead  of  admitting  his  exclusion  we  may, 
from  the  very  combination,  attain  a  larger  and  juster  comprehen- 


70  PARTICULAR    REVIEW    OP   THE 

sion  of  the  state  of  this  world,  of  the  manner  in  which  it  is  gov- 
erned, and  the  attributes  of  the  Governor. 

"  When,"  says  Hume,  in  his  Essay  on  Providence  and  a  Future 
State,  "we  infer  any  particular  cause  from  an  effect,  we  must  pro- 
portion the  one  to  the  other."  The  general  principle  is  a  sound 
one ;  and  by  means  of  it,  Hume  most  effectually  destroys  all  those 
flimsy  fabrics  which  sentimental  writers  have  reared  by  putting' 
together  all  that  is  fair  and  attractive,  and  leaving  out  of  view  ali 
that  is  dark  and  awful.  But  while,  by  carrying  out  this  principle,, 
he  has  successfully  undermined  that  weak  and  superficial  religion,, 
which  admhs  nothing  but  what  is  flattering  to  human  pride,  he  has 
not  used  it,  nor  could  it  be  expected  of  the  sceptic  that  he  should 
use  it,  for  the  uprearing  of  the  fabric  of  truth.  Yet  the  work  of 
building,  whatever  the  infidel  may  say  to  the  contrary,  is  always 
a  greater  and  nobler  work  than  that  of  destroying ;  and  the  fact 
Hume  has  scarcely  developed  or  demonstrated  a  single  great  truth 
in  his  philosophical  works,  is  a  proof  that  there  was  some  defect 
in  his  mind,  both  intellectually  and  morally.*  He  has  shown  thaty 
in  the  common  reasonings  on  the  subject  of  natural  theology,  the 
cause  is  not  proportioned  to  the  effect,  and  that  there  is  much  ii> 
the  effect  which  finds  no  place  in  the  cause.  But  in  doing  so,  he 
must  acknowledge  that  there  are  certain  phenomena  which  do 
constitute  an  effect,  and  this  effect  must  have  a  cause;  and  all5 
that  we  demand  is,  that  he  follow  out  his  own  principle,  and  pro- 
portion the  cause  to  the  effect,  and  find  something  ki  fche  cause 
corresponding  to  all  that  we  see  in  the  effect. 

The  phenomena  contemplated  by  the  man  disposed  to  religionr 
and  those  gloated  over  by  the  man  inclined  to  doubt,  do  seem  aE 
first  sight  opposed  to  one  another.  They  give,  in  consequence, 
some  appearance  of  support  to  that  theory  which  prevailed  for 
ages  so  extensively  in  the  East  among  the  meditative  spirits,  who 
dream  away  existence  under  a  relaxing  climate,  and  according  to- 
which  there  are  two  parallel  or  co-ordinate  ruling  powers  in  the 
world  ever  contending  with  each  other.  The  speculation  is  worthy 
of  being  alluded  to.  in  so  far  as  it  was  regarded  by  some  of  the 
deepest  thinkers  of  the  East,  as  furnishing  an  explanation  of 
events  otherwise  inexplicable.  In  modern  times,  Bayle  took  refuge 

*  "  I  am  apt,"  says  Hume  writing  to  Hutchison,  "  to  suspect,  in  general,  that  most 
of  my  reasonings  will  be  more  useful  by  furnishing  hints  and  exciting  people's  curi- 
osity, than  as  containing  any  principles  that  will  augment  the  stock  of  knowledge 
that  must  pass  to  future  ages."  (See  Life  by  Burton.) 


FIVE    PHENOMENA    BEFORE    SPECIFIED.  71 

in  this  theory,  not  because  he  believed  it,  but  because  it  supplied 
him  with  favorable  standing  room,  (and  this  is  what  the  sceptic 
experiences  most  difficulty  in  finding,  because  in  removing  the 
foundation  on  which  all  others  rest,  he  also  takes  away  the  foun- 
dation on  which  he  himself  should  rest,)  from  which  he  might 
with  greater  effect  play  off  his  fire  indiscriminately  on  all  sides, 
against  religion  and  against  infidelity,  against  the  believer  and 
against  the  doubter  too.  He  and  others  felt  that  the  theory  was 
so  far  plausible  that  it  professed  to  give  an  explanation  of  two 
seemingly  opposite  orders  of  facts,  while  other  religious  schemes 
only  furnish  an  explanation  of  one  of  them.  It  is  not  needful  to 
show  wherein  the  weakness  of  this  theory  lies.  The  progress  of 
science  has  demonstrated  to  the  satisfaction  of  every  mind  that 
laws  and  events,  which  may  seem  discordant,  do  yet  form  part  of 
one  compact  system,  originating  in  one  designing  mind.  But  if 
we  are  not  to  search  for  two  causes  of  the  effects  exhibited  in  the 
world,  we  must,  on  the  principle  laid  down  by  Hume,  proportion 
the  one  cause  to  the  character  of  the  whole  effect* 

We  insist,  then,  that  no  religious  scheme  be  constructed  which 
does  not  take  into  account  these  five  classes  of  phenomena.  Let 
us  contemplate — the  more  frequently  the  better — those  works  of 
God  which  reflect,  as  the  placid  lake,  the  serenity  of  heaven  on 
i heir  bosom;  but  let  us  not  forget  also  to  look  at  those  angry 
waves  and  troubled  depths  which  seem  to  say  that  heaven  is 
offended. 

Each  of  the  five  classes  of  phenomena  has  a  class  of  phenomena 
to  which  it  stands  in  seeming  opposition.  Let  us  review  them  in 
their  order. 

1.  On  the  one  hand,  there  are  around  and  within  us  abundant 
facts  to  prove  that  God  delights  in  the  happiness  of  his  creatures. 


*  Philo,  the  advocate  of  scepticism  in  Hume's  Dialogues  on  Natural  Religion, 
endeavors,  upon  a  survey  such  as  we  have  presented,  to  shut  us  up  into  one  or  other 
of  four  hypotheses  regarding  the  first  causes  of  the  universe.  "  That  they  are  endowed 
with  perfect  goodness,  that  they  have  perfect  malice,  that  they  are  opposite  and  have 
both  goodness  and  malice,  that  they  have  neither  goodness  nor  malice.  Mixed 
phenomena  can  never  prove  the  two  former,  unmixed  principles,  and  the  uniformity 
and  steadiness  of  general  laws,  seem  to  oppose  the  third.  The  fourth,  therefore, 
seems  by  far  the  most  probable." — P.  11.  In  these  Dialogues  the  academic  Theist  is 
represented  as  having  nothing  to  urge  against  this,  and  the  religious  Theist  (being  a 
complete  caricature)  urges  nothing  relevant.  We  regard  the  fourth  hypothesis  a* 
completely  disproved  by  the  clear  evidences  of  goodness  in  the  world,  and  the  whol« 
phenomena  can  be  explained  on  a  fifth  hypothesis,  being  that  advanced  in  the  text. 


72 


PARTICULAR    REVIEW    OF    THE 


The  darkest  fears  and  deepest  jealousies  of  the  human  breast 
cannot  bring  any  man  to  believe  that  God  is  a  malignant  being. 
When  a  disordered  mind  and  an  irritated  temper  would  tempt  him 
to  draw  such  a  conclusion,  he  is  driven  back  instantly  by  objects 
and  feelings  which  stand  up  in  defence  of  God.  But  strangely 
conflicting  with  these  more  pleasing  objects,  there  is  the  existence 
of  suffering,  and  especially  of  mental  suffering,  often  intense  and 
long  enduring.  With  the  views  which  modern  research  enables 
us  to  entertain  of  the  omnipotence  of  God,  we  cannot  resort  to  the 
old  Platonic  idea  of  evil  proceeding  from  the  restriction  or  limita- 
tion of  the  Divine  power.  Now,  if  there  be  design  in  every  part 
of  the  works  of  God.  there  must  be  design  in  the  infliction  of 
pain  also.  If  there  be  a  property  in  the  Divine  character  which 
leads  God  to  delight  in  the  happiness  of  his  creatures,  there  must 
also  be  a  property — call  it  what  you  please,  and  explain  it  as  you 
may — which  leads  him,  in  certain  circumstances,  to  inflict  pain. 
We  may  suppose  that  there  are  two  separate  Attributes  having 
their  root  in  the  Divine  character ;  or  we  may  r  jppose  them  to  be 
two  branches  of  the  same  attribute  ;  we  may  suppose  them  to  be 
what  are  called  the  benevolence  and  justice  ol  a  God  essentially 
good  both  in  his  benevolence  and  justice ;  or  wt  may  suppose  them 
but  two  modifications  of  the  one  attribute  of  goodness; — but  ana- 
lyze them  as  we  may,  and  dispute  as  we  may,  about  our  explana- 
tions, and  as  to  whether  these  explanations  differ  in  words  or  ideas, 
the  conclusion  rests  on  indisputable  facts,  that  if  God  is  led  by  his 
nature  to  propagate  happiness  throughout  a  boundless  universe,  he 
is  also  led,  in  certain  portions  of  it,  to  ordain  suffering.  Behold 
in  the  storm,  and  in  the  sunshine,  in  health  and  in  disease,  in 
wide-spread  happiness  and  crowded  misery,  th<i  proofs  both  of  the 
goodness  and  severity  of  God. 

But  why  does  God  inflict  this  misery?  Let  us  look  to  the  other 
phenomena,  and  inquire  if  they  can  yield  us  any  light. 

2.  It  would  be  vain  to  deny  that  man  is  allowed  a  large  share 
of  liberty.  He  feels  he  enjoys  it,  he  uses  it,  and  he  abuses  it.  He 
is  endowed  with  godlike  powers,  a  memory  that  enables  him  to 
live  the  past  over  again,  an  understanding  admitting  of  great  and 
indefinite  improvement,  a  fancy  which  can  flutter  among  pictures 
richer  than  any  realities,  an  imagination  which  stretches  away 
into  the  infinite,  and  a  heart  of  such  large  desires  that  the  whole 
world  cannot  satisfy  them. — Then  he  is  placed  in  a  position 
affording  room  for  the  exercise  of  his  facuM'^s,  and  1e  has  a  field 


FIVE    PHENOMENA    BEFORE    SPECIFIED. 

of  action  wider  than  he  can  occupy,  and  the  means  of  exerting 
the  mightiest  influence.  There  are  persons  who,  when  they  con- 
template these  facts,  delight  to  speak  of  the  dignity  of  man's  na- 
ture and  position.  He  is  a  God,  they  conclude,  and  is  so  honored 
by  the  supreme  God,  and  should  be  so  honored  by  us.  Dr. 
Channing  is  the  most  eloquent  representative  of  this  class  of 
writers,  who  would  have  us  to  look  on  human  nature  with  un- 
mirigied  feelings  of  pride  and  satisfaction,  and  represent  all  who 
would  speak  of  mankind  as  degenerate  as  the  greatest  enemies 
of  the  race.* 

But  the  picture,  however  pleasing,  is  not  consistent  with  other 
and  palpable  facts.  If  man  has  much  freedom  allowed  him,  he 
is  also  put  under  innumerable  restraints.  His  mightiest  under- 
takings often  end  in  confusion,  or  in  results  precisely  opposite  to 
those  contemplated  by  him.  He  is  interfered  with,  checked,  and 
punished  on  all  hands.  He  is  driven  back  when  he  is  most  eager, 
and  disappointed  when  his  hopes  may  seem  to  be  founded  on  the 
best  evidence.  Cross  events  which  we  call  accidents,  adversity 
under  all  its  forms,  besides  the  obvious  restraints,  arising  from  the 
direct  working  of  the  constitution  of  things  in  which  he  is  placed, 
all  combine  to  render  him  helpless  and  dependent.  He  seems  to 
be  trusted,  and  yet  he  is  distrusted.  He  has  liberty — of  this  he 
cannot  doubt — but  he  is  ever  watched  as  if  there  was  a  risk  of  his 
abusing  it,  nay,  restricted  as  if  he  had  already  abused  the  liberty 
granted  him.  All  nature  proclaims  that  God  is  good,  and  yet  seems 
to  indicate  that,  in  regard  to  this  world,  "  God  is  a  jealous  God." 

These  phenomena  exhibit  the  character  of  God  under  an  as- 
pect in  which  many  are  unwilling  to  contemplate  it.  Other  phe- 
nomena show  that  God's  character  comes  to  be  thus  exhibited, 
because  of  the  relation  in  which  he  stands  to  man. 

3.  The  unwearied  care  which  God  exercises  over  this  world,  is 
a  theme  on  which  the  piously-disposed  mind  delights  to  dwell. 
It  feels  a  peculiar  interest  in  tracing  the  wisdom  and  goodness  of 
God,  in  ordaining  and  superintending  all  things  ;  and  rejoices  to 
discover,  that  while  controlling  and  superintending  the  grand 
affairs  of  nations  and  of  worlds,  he  is  also  providing  for  the  mean- 
est of  the  wants  of  the  most  insignificant  of  his  creatures.  It  is 
manifest  that  the  greatest  events  are  not  beyond  his  control ;  and 
yet  that  those  which  may  seem  the  least  are  not  beneath  his 
notice. 

*  See  Sermon  on  "  Honor  all  Men." 


74  PARTICULAR    REVIEW    OF    THE 

In  seeming  contradiction  to  all  this  superintending  care,  there 
are  circumstances  which  look  as  if  God  had  abandoned  this  world 
to  itself,  and  ceased  to  take  any  oversight  of  it.  Near  though 
God  may  seem,  he  is  yet  felt  to  be  at  an  infinite  distance.  Man 
cannot  reach  him  by  any  of  his  struggles.  He  cannot  rise  to  him 
by  his  highest  aspirations.  There  are  means  by  which  the  in- 
telligent creature  may  hold  communion  with  other  creatures,  ani- 
mate and  inanimate,  but  no  direct  means  by  which  he  may 
attain  to  communion  with  his  Maker.  These  heavens,  when  he 
looks  up  to  them,  seem  to  be  covered  with  a  perpetual  cloud. 
There  must  be  something  coming  between,  when  the  beams  of 
God's  love,  shining  perpetually  on  all  holy  creatures,  are  obstructed 
in  regard  to  man.  That  intervening  cloud  cannot  come  from  the 
heavens,  which  it  merely  hides  from  our  eyes,  and  it  must  rise  up 
therefore  from  the  damps  of  this  earth.  In  short,  it  seems  as  if 
the  good  God  had  been  justly  offended,  and  offended  with  someth- 
ing in  the  character  of  man. 

To  determine  what  this  is,  we  must  now  look  to  the  character 
of  man  in  its  relation  to  God. 

4.  In  looking  to  the  nature  of  man,  we  find  that  there  is  an 
invariable  characteristic  by  which  he  is  distinguished,  and  that  is 
a  law  in  the  heart  testifying  in  behalf  of  what  is  good.  This  is 
of  the  nature  of  a  fundamental  principle.  It  is  a  principle  which 
may  be  obscured  or  perverted,  but  which  cannot  be  extinguished 
or  destroyed.  But  this  same  moral  nature  which  gives  its  testi- 
mony in  behalf  of  God,  gives  its  testimony  against  man.  That 
which  God  indicates  in  his  dealings  towards  man,  man  shows 
that  he  feels  by  his  conduct  towards  God.  God  shows  that  he  is 
offended  with  some  thing,  and  man  shows  what  this  is  by  taking 
guilt  to  himself.  The  idea,  the  very  name  of  God  is  associated  in 
the  human  mind  with  fear.  The  very  propensity  to  utter  blas- 
phemy shows  that  the  party  is  conscious  of  some  strong  inward 
feeling  to  which  he  would  show  his  superiority.  Man  acknowl 
edges  that  God  is  good,  and  that  his  law  is  good  ;  but  he  feels 
;ha'  thr  good  God  and  good  law  must  condemn  him,  and  thai 
they  must  do  so,  :-  because  they  are  good.  No  position  can  be 
more  unhappy.  Were  man  prepared,  when  he  feels  in  this  man- 
ner, to  prostrate  himself  before  God,  and  confess  his  utter  unwor- 
thiness,  the  case  would  not  be  so  hopeless.  But  it  is  the  worst 
feature  of  his  condition,  that  while  he  acknowledges  that  God  is 
good,  and  that  God  is  good  in  condemning  h;m,  he  yet  seeks,  if  it 


FIVE    PHENOMENA    BEFORE    SPECIFIED.  75 

were  possible,  to  flee  from  God,  or  hide  himself  from  him.  Con- 
scious all  the  time  that  he  is  wrong,  he  is  ever  driven  by  mingled 
pride  and  passion  to  carry  on  the  contest,  or  at  least  to  take  no 
proper  steps  to  heal  the  breach. 

We  have  seen  a  piece  of  rock  lying  bare  and  exposed  at  the 
base  of  a  huge  precipice.  From  the  shape  of  that  lesser  rock  you 
see  that  it  is  a  fragment,  that  it  was  once  joined  to  the  rocks 
above,  that  the  frosts  and  storms  of  winter  have  loosened  it,  and 
tkere  it  lies  useless  and  cumbersome,  and  utterly  incapable  of  be- 
ing united  by  human  art  to  the  parent  mass  from  which  it  has 
been  dissevered.  It  is  a  picture  of  the  soul  of  man,  torn  from  its 
God,  and  fallen  into  a  dreadful  abyss.  We  have  only  to  examine 
that  soul  to  discover  that  it  was  once  united  to  God,  but  that  it 
has  now  been  cut  off,  and  with  no  hope,  so  far  as  human  agency 
is  concerned,  of  the  two  being  re-united. 

5.  Looking  internally,  and  at  the  soul  itself,  we  find  that  not 
only  is  there  a  schism  between  man  and  his  Maker,  but  in  the 
very  nature  of  man  himself.  He  has  in  his  heart  a  law,  which 
condemns  the  very  heart  in  which  it  is  placed.  He  approves  of 
a  deed,  and  yet  neglects  to  perform  it ;  he  disapproves  of  a  deed, 
and  rushes  to  the  commission  of  it.  Moral  excellence  is  com- 
mended, and  yet  loathed  by  him  ;  and  sin  is  condemned,  and  yet 
cherished.  All  the  lines  of  external  proof,  we  have  seen,  seem  to 
lead  to  man  as  the  offending  party;  and  when  we  examine  his 
character,  we  find  him  conscious  of  the  guilt,  and  looking  as  if  he 
was  the  culprit  whose  conduct  has  entailed  such  misery  upon  our 
world. 

We  have  thus  endeavored  to  converge  the  scattered  rays  which 
are  to  be  found  in  the  darkness  of  this  world  into  a  focus,  that 
we  may  throw  light  upon  two  topics  of  surpassing  interest — the 
character  of  God  and  his  relationship  to  man.  Nature,  when 
rightly  interpreted,  seems  to  show  that  there  is  in  God  a  property 
or  attribute,  call  it  what  you  please — by  the  word  holiness,  or 
righteousness,  or  justice — which  leads  him  to  inflict  suffering,  and 
to  intimate  his  displeasure  against  sin  and  those  who  commit  it. 
It  would  appear  that  God  indicates  his  displeasure  against  man, 
and  men  universally  take  guilt  to  themselves.  God  hideth  him- 
self from  man,  and  man  hideth  himself  from  God.  The  two 
stand  apart,  as  we  have  seen  two  opposing  cliffs  which  had  been 
rent  asunder  by  some  dreadful  catastrophe  of  nature,  and  have 
now  a  yawning  gulf  between  ;  they  look  as  if  they  had  been 


76  OTHER    GENERAL    PHENOMENA    FITTED    TO 

united,  and  as  if  they  might  be  united  once  more  by  some  strong 
power  brought  to  bear  upon  them,  but  they  continue  to  stand 
apart  arid  frown  upon  each  other. 

"  They  stood  aloof,  the  scars  remaining, 
Like  cliffs  that  had  been  rent  asunder, 
A  dreary  sea  now  flows  between  ; 
But  neither  heat,  nor  frost,  nor  thunder, 
Shall  wholly  do  away,  I  ween, 
The  marks  of  that  which  once  hath  been." — COLEKIDGE. 

So  far  as  these  facts  throw  light  on  the  character  of  man,  we 
are  happy  to  be  able  to  quote  from  those  Thoughts  of  Pascal, 
which  are  in  some  respects  loose  as  the  leaves  of  the  sibyl,  but 
which  carry  us  farther  into  the  mysteries  of  this  world  than  the 
leaves  referred  to  were  supposed  to  carry  the  early  Romans  into 
the  future  history  of  their  country.  "  If  man  was  not  made  for 
God,  why  can  he  enjoy  no  happiness  but  in  God  ?  If  man  was 
made  for  God,  why  is  he  so  opposed  to  God  ?  Man  is  at  a  loss 
where  to  fix  himself.  He  is  unquestionably  out  of  his  way,  and 
feels  within  himself  the  remains  of  a  happy  state  which  he  can- 
not retrieve.  He  searches  in  every  direction  with  solicitude,  but 
without  success,  encompassed  with  unquenchable  darkness. 
Hence  arose  the  contest  among  the  philosophers,  some  of  whom 
endeavored  to  exalt  man  by  displaying  his  greatness,  and  others 
to  abase  him  by  representing  his  misery.  And  what  seems  more 
strange  is,  that  each  party  borrowed  the  arguments  of  the  other 
to  establish  their  own  opinion.  For  the  misery  of  man  may  be 
inferred  from  his  greatness,  and  his  greatness  from  his  misery. 
Thus  the  one  sect  demonstrated  his  misery  the  more  satisfactorily, 
in  that  they  inferred  it  from  his  greatness ;  and  the  other  the 
more  clearly  proved  his  greatness,  because  they  deduced  it  from 
his  misery.  Whatever  was  offered  by  the  one  to  establish  his 
greatness,  served  only  to  evince  his  misery,  it  being  more  miser- 
able to  have  fallen  from  the  greater  height.  And  the  converse  is 
equally  true.  So  that  in  this  endless  circle  of  dispute,  each  helps 
to  advance  his  adversary's  cause ;  for  it  is  certain  that  the  more 
men  are  enlightened,  the  more  they  will  discover  of  human  misery 
and  human  greatness.  In  a  word,  man  knows  himself  to  be 
miserable  :  he  is  therefore  miserable  because  he  knows  himself  to 
be  so.  But  he  is  also  eminently  great,  because  he  knows  himself 
to  be.  miserable.  What  a  chimera  then  is  man — what  a  novelty 


THROW    LIGHT    ON    THE    CONDITION    OP    THE    WORLD.        77 

—what  a  chaos — what  a  subject  of  contradiction  !  A  judge  of 
all  things,  and  yet  a  worm  of  the  earth  ;  the  depositary  of  the 
truth,  and  yet  a  medley  of  uncertainties  ;  the  glory  and  the  scan- 
dal of  the  universe.  If  he  exalt  himself,  1  humble  him  ;  if  he 
humble  himself,  I  exalt  him,  and  press  him  with  his  own  incon- 
sistencies, till  he  comprehends  himself  to  be  an  incomprehensible 
monster.'" 


SECTION"  II.— OTHER  GENERAL  PHENOMENA  FITTED  TO  THROW 
LIGHT  ON  THE  CONDITION  OF  THE  WORLD. 

So  far  we  have  proceeded  in  an  inductive  method,  drawing 
conclusions  from  well-established  facts,  all  but  universally  recog- 
nized. We  may  turn  to  some  more  general  considerations,  fitted 
to  throw  light  on  the  present  state  and  future  prospects  of  the 
world. 

When  the  Deity,  in  the  depths  of  eternity,  was  purposing  (to 
use  human  language)  the  creation  of  substances  different  from 
himself,  we  can  conceive  that  it  might  occur  to  him  to  create 
material  substances,  without  a  wish  or  will  of  any  kind,  and  com- 
pletely plastic  in  his  hands.  But  matter,  however  wrought  into 
beautiful  and  gorgeous  forms,  does  not  reflect  the  full  perfections 
of  God.  Besides  material  substances,  the  fulness  of  God's  love 
would  prompt  him  to  create  spiritual  beings  with  intelligence  and 
free-will.  Such  beings  must,  from  their  very  nature,  be  swayed 
by  influences  totally  different  from  those  by  which  God  regulates 
the  material  universe.  It  is  one  of  the  most  noble  and  godlike 
qualities  of  spiritual  intelligences,  that  they  are  enabled  and  re- 
quired to  act,  for  themselves.  Were  the  freedom  of  their  will 
interfered  with,  they  would  cease  to  be  what  they  are,  and  would 
be  stripped  of  one  of  their  most  exalted  and  distinguishing 
features. 

To  such  creatures,  their  Creator  would  by  some  means  or  other 
give  a  law,  with  power  to  obey  it  if  they  so  chose,  but  with  free- 
dom to  disobey  it.  Virtue  is  not  virtue  properly  speaking,  when 
it  is  constrained.  Every  praiseworthy  deed  must  be  free  and 
spontaneous.  But  it  may  be  involved  in  the  very  nature  of  a 
state  of  freedom,  that  those  who  possess  it  are  liable  to  abuse  it. 
It  is  conceivable,  then,  that  wherever  there  are  responsible  beings, 
there  may  also,  on  the  part  of  some  or  many,  be  a  disobedience 
of  that  law  which  the  Creator  hath  prescribed  as  the  rule  of  obe- 


OTHER    GENERAL    PHENOMENA   FITTED   TO 

dience.  A  condition  of  things,  in  which  such  disobedience  was 
impossible,  may  pre-sufpose  either  that  no  freedom  of  will  has 
been  given,  or  that  it  is  being  interfered  with.  It  is  reasonable, 
no  doubt,  to  suppose  that  this  disobedience  must  be  something  of 
rare  occurrence  in  the  dominions  of  God  ;  but  that  which  is  pos- 
sible may  be  occurring  somewhere,  and  there  may  be  some  indi- 
viduals, or  some  races,  who  have  fallen  away  from  the  purity  in 
which  they  were  created. 

There  is  nothing  unreasonable,  then,  in.  the  idea  that  there 
may  be  a  fallen  world  somewhere.  The  pride  of  the  human 
heart  may  rebel  against  the  very  thought,  that  the  race  to  which 
we  belong  can  be  thus  degenerate.  But  it  is  surely  not  impossible 
that  there  may  be  a  world  which  has  thus  lapsed  into  sin  ;  and  it 
is  our  duty  to  join  the  light  which  observation,  reason,  and  man's 
moral  nature  furnish,  in  order  to  determine  whether  we  may  not 
be  living  in  such  a  world. 

A  priori  it  might  seem  as  if  the  chances  of  our  being  in  a 
spotless  world,  were  much  greater  than  of  our  being  in  a  fallen 
world ;  but  we  have  to  do  here,  not  with  chances,  but  with  real- 
ities— not  with  conjectural  probabilities,  but  with  facts.  Judging 
a  priori,  the  actual  world  is  not  such  as  we  would  suppose  it 
likely  that  God  would  fashion.  We  must  set  aside  our  self-formed 
conceptions  of  what  is  likely  to  be,  and  taking  things  as  they 
are,  inquire  what  view  the  facts  before  our  eyes  and  revealed  to 
our  consciousness  give  of  this  world  and  of  its  relation  to  its  Gov* 
ernor. 

There  are  indications  in  the  world,  as  it  appears  to  us.  of  four 
great  general  truths. 

FIRST,  THERE  ARE  INDICATIONS  OF  THE  BEAUTIFUL,  THK 
BENEFICENT,  AND  THE  GOOD.  These  features  strike  the  senses,, 
impress  the  fancy,  and  move  the  soul  of  all,  The  painter  delight* 
to  exhibit  them  to  the  eye,  and  the  poet  to  the  mind  ;  the  man  of 
taste  expatiates  in  their  grandeur  and  beauty  5  while  the  religious 
man  feels  as  if  they  helped  him  upward  to  the  contemplation  of 
the  excellence  of  God. 

SECONDLY,  THERE  ARE  INDICATIONS  OF  THE  LOVELY  AND 
THE  GOOD  BEING  MARRED  AND  DEFACED.  There  is  disorder  in 
the  very  midst  of  order,  and  sin  in  the  very  heart  which  approves 
of  excellence.  The  useful  becomes  destructive,  and  the  good  has 
become  evil.  We  feel  in  treading  the  ground,  as  if  we  were  walk- 
ing over  the  withering  leaves  of  a  life  which  had  decayed.  We 


THROW    LIGHT    ON    THE    CONDITION    OF    THE    VORLD.        79 

cannot  but  admire  the  magnificence  which  everywhere  meets  our 
eye  ;  yet  it  is  with  an  associated  feeling  of  melancholy,  like  that 
which  the  traveller  experiences  when  he  surveys  Balbec,  or  Pal- 
myra, Luxor,  and  Carnac.  The  wise  and  the  good  have  ever 
been  inclined  to  look  upon  this  world  as  but  the  ruin  of  its  former 
greatness.  Man,  and  the  world  in  which  he  dwells,  retain  many 
traces  of  former  greatness.  The  ruins  of  a  palace  differ  from  the 
ruins  of  a  hut.  In  the  former,  the  work  of  desolation  may  be 
more  complete  than  in  the  latter ;  but  we  find  here  and  there  in 
the  one  what  we  cannot  find  in  the  other — a  column  or  statue  of 
surpassing  beauty  indicating  what  the  building  was  when  it  came 
forth  'from  the  hands  of  its  maker.  Not  only  so,  but  a  palace  in 
ruins  is  a  grander  object  than  a  hut  when  entire.  "  The  stately 
ruins  are  visible  to  every  eye  that  bear  in  their  front  (yet  extant) 
this  doleful  inscription — here  God  once  dwelt.  Enough  appears 
of  the  admirable  frame  and  structure  of  the  soul  of  rnan  to  show 
that  the  Divine  presence  did  once  dwell  in  it,  more  than  enougn 
of  vicious  deformity  to  proclaim  he  is  now  retired  and  gone." 
"Look  upon  the  fragments  of  that  curious  sculpture  which  once 
adorned  the  palace  of  that  Great  King — the  relics  of  common  no- 
tions— the  lively  prints  of  some  undefaced  truth — the  fair  ideas 
of  things — the  yet  legible  precepts  that  relate  to  practice.  Behold 
with  what  accuracy  the  broken  pieces  show  these  to  have  been 
engraven  by  the  finger  of  God ;  and  how  they  be  torn  and  scat- 
tered, one  in  this  dark  corner,  and  another  in  that,  buried  in  heaps 
of  dust  and  rubbish."* 

But  these  two  truths  do  not  constitute  the  whole  truth ;  and 
there  are  persons  who  have  discovered  this,  and  have  rashly  con- 
cluded that  the  one  or  other  is  not  a  truth  at  all.  There  is  A 
THIRD  TRUTH  to  be  taken  into  account  by  those  who  would  give 
a  rational  explanation  of  existing  circumstances.  Besides  the 
traces  of  original  beauty  and  subsequent  destruction,  THERE  ARE 

PROOFS  OF  RECONSTRUCTION  OR  REORGANIZATION.   A  man 

cannot  understand  the  condition  of  the  world  in  which  he  lives, 
except  he  looks  to  all  these  characteristics.  Those  who  have 
confined  their  view  to  one  or  two  of  them,  have  found  them- 
selves in  the  heart  of  inexplicable  enigmas.  Persons  who  look 
only  to  the  grandeur  of  the  world,  are  confounded  every  day  with 
occurrences  strangely  at  variance  with  the  views  which  they  en- 
tertain of  the  perfection  of  this  world.  Men  who  regard  this 
*  Howe's  Living  Temple. 


80  OTHER    GENERAL    PHENOMENA    PITTED    T" 

earth  as  utterly  cursed,  w'  hout  considering  its  original  perfection, 
are  obliged,  in  holding  their  opinions,  to  shut  their  eyes  to  the 
loveliness  which  is  everywhere  visible,  if  they  will  but  look  at  it. 
Nor  have  those  who  represent  this  world  as  a  temple  in  ruins, 
reached  the  whole  truth.  In  a  ruin,  everything  is  abandoned  and 
desolate.  The  parts  of  the  fabric  yet  entire,  and  the  heaps  of 
rubbish,  are  alike  tenantless  and  useless.  The  whole  scene  is 
waste,  and  through  neglect  is  becoming  more  and  more  horrific. 
But  our  earth  is  not  thus  deserted.  Care  the  most  watchful  is 
exercised  over  it,  and  over  every  the  most  minute  fragment  of 
it.  We  discover  the  lamentable  results  of  a  mighty  conflict,  but 
no  signs  of  neglect  or  abandonment.  In  a  ruin,  everything  is 
misplaced  ;  and  except  when  accident  has  so  determined  in  some 
of  its  freaks,  the  contiguous  objects  do  not  suit  or  help  each  other. 
**»U  in  this  world  we  discover  everywhere  the  nicest  adaptation  of 
part  to  part,  and  power  to  power.  Anrdst  seeming  confusioa 
tliere  is  a  grand  pervading  unity  of  design.  For  the  purposes 
contemplated,  nothing  is  wanting,  while  there  is  nothing  super- 
fluous. Chateaubriand  developed  a  greater  truth  than  he  was  at 
all  aware  of,  when  he  described  this  world  as  a  "  Temple  fallen, 
and  rebuilt  with  its  own  ruins"* 

"  We  are  not  to  look  upon  this  world  as  a  perfect  world,"  says 
Butler,  expressing  the  view  of  every  sober  thinker.  But  the  re- 
flecting mind  follows  up  this  admission  by  the  inquiry,  Why  is  it 
not  perfect?  Care  must  be  taken,  lest  the  acknowledgment  that 
the  world  is  not  perfect  land  us  in  the  conclusion  that  God  is  not 
perfect.t  The  one  element  of  imperfection  in  this  world  is  the 
character  of  man.  We  have  already  referred  to  the  grounds  on 
which  we  can  explain  the  existence  of  sin,  under  the  government 
of  a  God  who  rules  his  responsible  creatures  by  moral  influences 
which  do  not  interfere  with  the  freedom  of  the  will.  But  what- 
ever may  be  the  solution  of  the  difficulty  which  proceeds  from  the 
existence  of  moral  evil,  we  hold  it  to  be  of  great  moment  to  estab- 
lish the  doctrine  that  this  world  is  perfect  considered  in  reference 
to  those  who  dwell  in  it.  There  may  be  a  difference  of  opinion 
as  to  whether  a  satisfactory  explanation  can  be  given  of  the  ori- 
gin of  evil,  or  whether  there  can  be  any  other  than  the  one 
already  hinted  at ;  but  moral  evil  being  supposed  to  exist,  it  is  of 
the  last  importance  to  show  that  the  other  apparent  evils  flow 

*  G6nie  du  Christianisme. 

f  See  Hume's  Dialogues  on  Natural  Religion,  where  this  conclusion  is  drawa 


THROW    LIGHT    ON    THE    CONDITION    OF    THE    WORLD.        81 

from  it, — '''After  it,  the  permission  of  sin,"  says  Leibnitz,  "  is  jus- 
tified, the  other  evil  in  its  train  presents  no  difficulty,  and  we  are 
now  entitled  to  resort  to  the  evil  of  sin  to  give  a  reason  for  the 
evil  of  pain."*  Moral  evil  being  pre-supposed,  it  may  now  be 
shown  that  physical  evil  in  no  way  reflects  on  the  character  of 
God.  There  are  perverted  minds  who  may  not  think  the  govern- 
ment of  God  perfect  because  it  ordains  pain  and  sorrow,  and  pro- 
vides restraints  and  penalties ;  and  if  they  follow  out  their  prin- 
ciples, they  must  conclude  that  God  is  not  perfect.  But  with  the 
proofs  so  abundant  of  the  perfection  of  God,  in  respect  of  all  other 
departments  of  his  works,  it  becomes  us  to  inquire  whether  his 
government  be  not  perfect  in  respect  also  of  the  ordaining  of 
suffering  and  punishment. 

In  the  simple  and  single  parts  of  God's  works,  whether  in  the 
mineral  or  animal  or  vegetable  kingdoms,  we  never  discover  a 
mean  without  an  end.  There  is  a  usp,  for  instance,  for  every 
nerve,  and  muscle,  and  bone,  and  joint  of  the  animal  frame. 
Physiologists  all  proceed  on  the  principle  that  there  is  nothing  un- 
necessary in  the  organization  of  plants  and  animals ;  and  the 
careful  investigation  of  parts  that  seemed  useless  has  led  Cuvier 
and  others  to  some  of  their  greatest  discoveries.  It  is  upon  this 
principle  that  the  geologist  and  comparative  anatomist  proceed 
in  the  inferences  which  they  draw  from  the  animal  remains  found 
among  the  rocks.  That  bone,  they  conclude,  must  have  served 
a  purpose,  and  belonged  to  a  living  creature;  and  from  the  exami- 
nation of  it,  they  arrive  at  a  knowledge  of  the  shape,  size,  food, 
and  habits  of  an  animal  which  may  have  been  extinct  for  myriads 
of  ages.  Proceeding  on  this  principle  they  can  clothe  their  bones 
with  sinews  and  flesh,  and  furnish  a  painting  in  which  the  living 
animals  are  seen  browsing  among  the  reeds  and  ferns  and  trees 
of  an  ancient  world. 

Now,  we  believe,  that  there  is  as  little  of  useless  waste  in  the 
more  complicated  dealings  of  God's  providence  as  in  the  construc- 
tion of  plants  and  animals.  The  most  ordinary  observer  may  dis- 
cover that  all  the  events  of  God's  providence  are  linked  or  dovetailed 
together.  The  most  rapid  concentrations  of  the  various  parts  of 
an  army  towards  a  point  by  the  pre-arrangement  of  a  general,  the 
most  skilful  adjustment  of  wheel  and  cylinder  in  an  ingenious 
machine,  do  not  so  impress  us  with  all-pervading  order  and  design, 
as  the  combinations  and  concatenations  of  events  in  the  providence 

*  Essays  on  the  Goodness  of  God.     P.  iii.  s.  265. 
fi 


OTHER    GENERAL    PHENOMENA    FITTED    TO 

of  God.  The  whole  analogy  of  nature,  then,  forbids  us  from  im- 
agining that  disease,  and  sorrow,  and  the  manifest  restraints  and 
punishments  laid  upon  man,  are  incidental  or  accidental.  It 
would,  indeed,  be  strange  if,  while  everything  else  was  subservient 
to  a  purpose,  such  painful  dispensations  should  be  permitted,  with- 
out an  end  to  accomplish  by  them. 

But  to  return  from  this  seeming  digression,  we  find  everywhere 
in  the  wrorld  traces  of  original  grandeur  and  subsequent  ruin,  and 
we  find  both  united  in  a  compact  and,  in  some  respects,  harmoni- 
ous whole.  Our  world  in  this  respect  resembles  those  conglome- 
rate rocks,  which  are,  indeed,  the  detritus  of  a  former  formation, 
and  seem  now  to  be  a  curious  jumble,  but  which,  notwithstanding, 
through  the  binding  together  of  the  parts,  are  among  the  hardest 
and  most  consistent  of  all  rocks  in  their  texture. 

We  see  before  us  now,  not  a  ruin,  but  a  compact  fabric, — 

"  A  ruin,  yet  what  a  ruin — from  its  mass 
Walls,  palaces,  half  cities  have  been  reared." 

The  impression  left  upon  our  mind  is  not  so  much  like  that  pro- 
duced by  Thebes  or  the  cities  of  the  desert,  as  by  modern  Jerusa- 
lem, still  a  city,  but  in  singular  contrast  with  its  former  greatness. 
There  are  evidences  that  the  building  is  far  inferior  to  the  original 
one;  and  here  and  there  you  see  a  stone  of  the  first  fabric,  in  some 
respects  sadly  out  of  place,  yet  all  admirably  fitted  to  uphold  the 
existing  structure.  That  fabric  is  not  a  perfect  one,  such  as  it 
seems  once  to  have  been>  but  it  is  in  every  respect  suited  to  the 
imperfect  individuals  who  dwell  in  it.  It  resembles  those  palaces 
which  have  been  turned  into  hospitals,  retaining  some  marks  of 
their  being  originally  designed  for  a  nobler  purpose,  and  causing  us 
to  sigh  over  the  degradation  to  which  they  have  been  subjected, 
but  accommodated,  notwithstanding,  by  a  \vonderful  dexterity  to 
the  good  end  which  they  now  serve. 

Such  are  the  intimations  of  nature,  and  nature,  it  must  be  con- 
fessed, goes  little  farther  than  to  raise  salutary  fears  and  stir  up 
inquiry.  It  prompts  us  to  put  questions  which  it  does  not  deign  to 
answer.  It  calls  up  fears  which  it  cannot  allay.  It  ever  conducts 
to  a  yawning  gulf  covered  with  clouds.  There  may  be  a  country 
beyond,  but  it  does  not  show  it.  There  may  be  a  passage  to  that 
land,  but  it  does  not  disclose  it.  The  same  impression  is  left  as 
by  the  voyages  hitherto  made  to  discover  a  north-west  passage — 
there  is  enough  to  excite  curiosity  and  animate  hope,  but  not 


THROW    LIGHT    ON    THE    CONDITION    OF    THE    WORLD.        83 

enough  to  conduct  to  certainty.  Still  there  are  times  when  the 
mists  seem  to  open,  and  show  a  better  destiny  to  the  human  family, 
and  a  passage  to  it.  There  are  times  when,  like  Columbus  as  he 
approached  the  coasts  of  the  new  world,  we  think  we  see  in  the 
night  a  light  from  the  countr/  in  whose  existence  we  are  inclined 
to  believe.  But  this  leads  us  to  observe  that — 

FOURTHLY,  THERE  ARE  INDICATIONS  OF  INTENDED  RENO- 
VATION. For  why  has  this  world,  so  manifestly  under  the  dis- 
pleasure of  God,  been  preserved?  As  a  prison-house,  our  fears 
would  suggest.  But  hope,  equally  natural  with  fear  to  the  human 
breast,  immediately  throws  out  the  idea  that  it  may  be  as  a  school 
of  discipline  and  probation.  It  certainly  does  not  look  as  if  it  was 
exclusively  a  school  for  training  to  virtue — for  there  are  signal 
judgments  inflicted  on  the  wicked,  not  to  train  them,  but  so  far  as 
this  world  is  concerned,  to  put  an  end  to  discipline.  But  still  less 
does  it  look  as  if  it  was  altogether  a  prison,  and  fitted  merely  for 
punishment,  for  there  are  innumerable  means  of  improvement  and 
incentives  to  excellence.  May  it  not  be,  that  it  is  a  place  of  pro- 
bation as  preparatory  to  a  final  judgment  and  consummation? 

The  very  preservation  of  this  world  in  its  present  state  seems 
to  show  that  God  did  not  intend  it  merely  as  a  place  of  punish- 
ment. Among  the  withered  leaves  on  which  we  tread  there  are 
to  be" found  the  seeds  of  a  coming  renovation,  and  these  leaves  are 
preserved  for  a  time  that  the  seeds  may  germinate  in  the  rnidst  of 
them.  In  this  world  there  are  evidences  of  God's  hatred  to  evil ; 
there  are  also  proofs  of  his  disposition  to  mercy  and  grace.  The 
human  mind  has  ever  been  prone  to  fancy  that  this  world  is  yet 
to  be  the  theatre  of  great  events,  in  which  all  the  perfections  of 
God's  character  are  to  be  displayed.  Tradition  has  delighted  to 
converse,  and  poetry  to  sing,  of  a  golden  age  as  the  commencing 
one  in  our  world's  history ;  and  both  have  fondly  looked  forward 
to  a  time  when  all  things  are  to  be  restored  to  their  primal  state. 
But  tradition  retains  only  that  portion  of  the  truth  which  recom- 
mends itself  to  the  principles  of  the  human  heart,  and  true  poetry 
ever  sings  in  accordance  with  the  native  feelings,  and  philosophy 
should  not  pour  contempt  on  those  high  expectations  which  form 
the  noblest  aspirations  of  human  nature,  and  which  we  may  sup- 
pose God  would  not  have  allowed  to  remain  there,  if  there  was  to 
be  no  means  of  gratifying  them. 

God  seems  to  have  departed  from  our  world ;  but  as  if  to  prove 
his  remaining  interest  in  us,  he  hath  left  a  train  of  light  behind. 


84  OTHER    GENERAL    PHENOMENA    FITTED    TO 

We  do  feel  as  if  there  were  yet  a  lingering  light  upon  our  world, 
like  that  which  rests  upon  the  earth  at  the  darkest  hour  of  a  sum- 
mer's night,  left  by  a  sun  which  has  set,  but  which  may  yet  appear, 
or  sent  before  by  a  sun  soon  to  arise.  Even  when  our  fears  do 
most  harass  us  we  discover  tokens  for  good.  We  see,  it  is  true, 
no  sun  as  yet  appearing  above  the  horizon  ;  hut  on  the  earth  itself, 
on  some  of  its  higher  elevations,  on  some  of  its  more  prominent 
peaks  rising  up  from  among  the  darkest  shadows;  or  on  some  of 
the  clouds  which  overhang  it,  we  discover  a  kindling  light,  which 
seems  to  show  that  there  is  a  glorious  luminary  yet  to  rise,  and 
that  our  earth  is  to  be  visited  by  a  brighter  and  more  glori- 
ous era. 

Some  persons  may  be  inclined  to  argue  that  we  could  never 
have  discovered  these  truths  from  nature  alone  without  the  aid  of 
revelation.  With  such  parties  we  are  not  inclined  to  enter  into  a 
contest.  If  their  statements  be  sufficiently  guarded,  it  is  probable 
that  we  may  agree  with  them,  and  might  yet  hold,  with  perfect 
consistency,  that  while  there  is  a  difficulty  in  interpreting  nature, 
these  are  yet  the  very  truths  which  nature  teaches.  Let  it  be  grant- 
ed that  the  writing  inscribed  on  the  works  of  God  is  not  very  clear, 
still  the  letters  are  there,  and  start  into  legibility  upon  being  placed 
under  the  power  of  Divine  truth.  It  required  the  genius  of  Coper- 
nicus and  Newton  to  discover  the  true  theory  of  the  heavens ;  but 
when  that  theory  is  known  it  requires  no  such  genius  to  observe 
that  it  is  confirmed  by  every  phenomenon  before  our  eyes.  It 
may  require,  in  like  manner,  a  supernatural  light  to  give  the  true 
explanation  of  the  mysteries  of  nature  ;  but  now,  with  that  expla- 
nation before  us,  we  see  that  nature  has  many  of  its  most  difficult 
knots  unravelled  by  it. 

Not  only  so,  but  the  very  fact  that  the  Scriptures  furnish  such 
an  explanation  of  nature,  may  be  regarded  as  a  proof  of  their 
heavenly  origin.  The  writings  on  the  tombs  and  temples  of 
ancient  Egypt  long  baffled  the  skill  of  the  most  distinguished 
scholars.  It  was  the  Rosetta  stone,  with  its  triple  inscriptions,  one 
of  them  being  Greek  and  a  translation  of  the  two  hieroglyphical 
ones,  which  first  furnished,  or  rather  suggested  the  discovery  of 
the  key.  The  key  thus  suggested  by  the  Greek  translation  is 
shown  to  be  a  true  one,  by  the  number  of  hidden  meanings  which 
it  has  satisfactorily  opened.  Now,  let  it  be  acknowledged,  if  per- 
sons insist  on  it,  that  the  inscriptions  on  the  works  of  God  are  not 
very  easily  deciphered,  still  if  it  is  found  that  a  professed  revelation 


THROW    LIGHT    ON    THE    CONDITION    OF    THE    WORLD.        85 

explains  them,  and  that  the  two  coincide,  there  is  evidence  fur- 
nished both  in  behalf  of  the  genuineness  of  the  revelation  and  the 
correctness  of  the  interpretation  which  has  been  put  upon  nature. 
As  it  opens  chamber  after  chamber  we  become  convinced  that  we 
have  at  last  got  the  true  key.  "  A  person  discovering  the  proofs 
of  the  Christian  religion  is  like  an  heir  finding  the  title-deeds  of 
his  estate.  Shall  he  condemn  them  as  counterfeit,  or  cast  them 
aside  without  examination  ?"  "Who  can  do  otherwise  than  admire 
and  embrace  a  religion  which  contains  the  complete  knowledge  of 
truths  which  we  still  know  the  better  the  more  we  receive?"' 

We  are  yet,  however,  but  in  the  vestibule  of  the  temple  of 
nature ;  and  some  may  regard  us  as  speculating  beyond  the  evi- 
dence as  yet  within  our  range  of  vision.  All  we  ask  of  such  is. 
that  they  now  follow  us  into  the  temple  itself;  and  we  must  be 
prepared  to  abandon  the  views  which  have  suggested  themselves, 
if  they  are  not  confirmed  upon  the  most  minute  and  rigid  exami- 
nation of  the  physical  and  moral  governments  of  God, 

*  Pascal's  Thoughts. 


METHOD  OF  THE  DIVINE  GOVERNMENT, 


BOOK  SECOND. 

PARTICULAR  INQUIRY  INTO  THE  METHOD  OF  THE  DIVINE  GOV- 
ERNMENT IN  THE  PHYSICAL  WORLD. 

IN  the  exploring  expedition  on  which  we  have  set  out,  we  have 
first,  as  from  a  height,  taken  a  general  survey  of  the  country  be- 
fore us,  as  the  traveller  will  seek  to  do  when  circumstances  admit, 
at  the  outset  of  his  journey.  We  are  now  to  descend  to  a  detailed 
examination  of  the  territory  whose  outline  we  have  been  survey- 
ing. We  are  in  the  first  instance  to  enter  into  the  heart  of  the 
physical  world  as  the  same  bears  relation  to  man,  and  then  con- 
sider the  character  of  man  as  under  the  government  of  God.  As 
a  suitable  conclusion,  we  may  then  gather  the  results  together, 
and  view  them  in  combination. 


CHAPTER  I.— GENERAL  LAWS. 

SECTION  I.— PROPERTIES  OF   MATTER— DIFFERENT  THINGS  DENOTED 
BY  THE  PHRASE  "  LAWS  OF  NATURE." 

THE  most  ignorant  and  careless  observer  cannot  contemplate 
the  works  of  nature  without  discovering  abundant  proofs  of  the 
existence  of  general  laws.  Science,  as  it  advances,  has  been 
widening  the  dominion  of  law,  and  has  detected  its  presence 
where  the  unlearned  saw  only  caprice,  and  where  the  piously  dis- 
posed mind  was  accustomed  to  contemplate  the  Divine  power  act- 
ing independently  of  all  instrumental  causes.  It  i«»  r»ow  arimw* 


GENERAL    LAWS.  87 

edged  that  there  are  physical  laws  determining  every  "  fitful 
breeze,  and  every  forming  cloud,  and  every  falling  shower."  But 
while  there  is  a  universal  recognition  among  the  reflecting  com- 
munity of  the  existence  of  general  laws,  there  is  about  as  univer- 
sal a  confusion  of  idea  as  to  the  nature  of  these  laws.  An  inquiry 
into  this  topic  may  help  to  clear  away  much  cloudiness  of  concep- 
tion, in  which  not  a  few  errors  have  been  lurking. 

"  Without  going  into  any  subtilties,"  says  Sir  John  Herschell, 
"  I  may  at  least  be  allowed  to  suggest  that  it  is  at  least  high  time 
that  philosophers,  both  physical  and  others,  should  come -to  some 
nearer  agreement  than  seems  to  prevail  as  to  the  meaning  they 
intend  to  convey  in  speaking  of  causes  and  causation.  On  the 
one  hand,  we  are  told  that  the  grand  object  of  physical  inquiry  is 
to  explain  the  nature  of  phenomena  by  referring  them  to  their 
causes  ;  on  the  other,  that  the  inquiry  into  causes  is  altogether 
vain  and  futile,  and  that  science  has  no  concern  but  with  the  dis- 
covery of  laws.  Which  of  these  is  the  truth  ?  Or  are  both  views 
of  the  matter  true,  on  a  different  interpretation  of  the  terms? 
Whichever  view  we  may  take,  or  whichever  interpretation  we 
may  adopt,  there  is  one  thing  certain,  the  extreme  inconvenience 
of  such  a  state  of  language.  This  can  only  be  reformed  by  a 
careful  analysis  of  the  widest  of  all  human  generalizations,  dis- 
entangling from  one  another  the  innumerable  shades  of  meaning 
which  have  got  confounded  together  in  its  progress,  and  establish- 
ing among  them  a  rational  classification  and  nomenclature.  Until 
this  be  done,  we  cannot  be  sure,  that  by  the  relation  of  cause  and 
effect,  one  and  the  same  kind  of  relation  is  understood,  &c."*  Sir 
John  Herschell  then  goes  on  to  observe,  that  the  errors  to  be  found 
in  such  works  as  the  "  Philosophic  Positive"  of  Comte,  (and  he 
might  have  added  the  Vestiges  of  Creation,)  originate  in  confused 
notions  in  regard  to  the  nature  of  physical  laws. 

The  remark  of  this  distinguished  philosopher  is  one  of  the 
many  signs  of  the  times  which  indicate  that  while  scientific  men 
in  the  present  day  are  commonly  disposed  to  turn  away  from  met- 
aphysical philosophy,  they  will  soon  be  compelled  to  betake  them- 
selves to  it ;  not  only  with  the  view  of  constructing  a  correct  logic 
of  physical  investigation,  but  for  the  very  purpose  of  expelling 
the  errors  which  have  taken  refuge  in  the  region  of  fundamental 
principles — a  region,  no  doubt,  often  covered  with  clouds,  but 
where  all  the  streams  of  science  have  their  fountains. 

*  President's  Address  to  British  Association,  1845,  from  Athenaeum. 


88  GENERAL    LAWS. 

We  have  long  felt  the  desideratum  to  which  Sir  John  Herschell 
refers,  and  we  have  especially  felt  it  when  seeking  to  discuss  the 
questions  which  fall  to  be  answered  in  the  inquiry  into  the  physi- 
cal government  of  God.  It  would  be  presumptuous  in  us  to  pro- 
fess to  supply  what  so  many  feel  to  be  wanting,  and  yet  have  not 
been  able  to  furnish.  The  subject  to  be  discussed,  however, 
requires  us  to  make  the  attempt.  While  we  endeavor  to  disen- 
tangle a  matter  which  appears  to  many  to  be  so  complicated,  we 
are  at  the  same  time  convinced  that  the  conclusions  to  be  drawn, 
in  the  subsequent  parts  of  this  book,  are  to  a  great  extent  inde- 
pendent of  any  particular  theory,  which  may  be  formed  or  prefer- 
red in  regard  to  the  precise  nature  of  general  laws,  or  the  relation 
between  cause  and  effect. 

On  looking  round  us,  we  find  ourselves  to  be  surrounded  by 
material  substances.  (We  refuse  in  this  Treatise  to  enter  into 
discussion  with  those  who  deny  the  existence  of  substances  ma- 
terial or  spiritual.)  Omitting  for  the  present  the  phenomena  of 
the  human  mind,  and  confining  our  attention  to  corporeal  sub- 
stances, we  find  these  substances  capable  of  producing  changes 
on  each  other.  This  production  of  changes  is  not  variable  or  ca- 
pricious, but  follows  certain  invariable  laws.  Substances,  simple 
and  compound,  separate  and  in  union,  in  mechanical  and  chemi- 
cal combination,  change  and  are  changed  according  to  certain 
rules.  These  are  the  properties  of  the  substance,  and  all  sub- 
stances have  their  definite  properties — that  is,  a  determinate 
method  of  producing  changes  on  each  other.  Such  is  the  very 
constitution  of  these  substances,  and  such  the  very  constitution 
of  the  world  in  which  these  substances  exist.  Bacon  briefly  ex- 
presses these  truths.  "  Nothing  exists  in  nature  except  individual 
bodies,  producing  pure  individual  acts,  according  to  the  law  that 
governs  them.''* 

In  looking  more  narrowly  into  the  nature  of  these  properties, 
we  find  that  no  given  body  acts  upon  itself.  Bodies,  when  they 
act,  act  upon  each  other.  Take  any  one  particle  or  body,  and 
separate  it  from  all  others,  and  it  continues  in  the  state  in  which 
you  have  put  it  forever.  In  order  to  a  change  in  that  body,  there 
must  be  another  body  operating  upon  it.  Now,  the  power  which 
one  body  has  of  changing  another,  or  of  being  itself  changed  by 
another,  we  call  a  property  of  that  body — the  former,  for  the  sake 
of  distinction,  may  be  called  a  power,  and  the  latter  a  suscepti- 
*  Nov.  Org.,  Lib.  il  Aph.  2. 


GENERAL    LAWS.  89 

bility.  And,  let  it  be  observed,  that  all  the  properties  of  bodies, 
be  they  powers  or  susceptibilities,  consist  in  their  capability  of 
changing  other  substances,  or  of  their  being  themselves  changed. 
All  the  properties  of  any  given  substance  have  thus  a  reference 
to  some  other  substance  or  substances,  and  to  the  production  of 
change  upon  that  substance  or  these  substances.  The  only  ex- 
ception that  we  can  think  of,  is  the  property  of  extension,  or 
rather  the  occupation  of  space,  which,  as  having  a  reference  to 
space  rather  than  to  other  matter,  may  be  regarded  as  the  quality 
which  matter  has  per  se,  and  hence  there  may  be  some  truth  in 
the  idea  propounded  by  Descartes  and  others,  that  extension  is 
peculiarly  the  essential  property  of  matter.*  But  without  dwelling 
on  this,  we  affirm  that  the  other  qualities  of  nature  are  its  power? 
of  affecting  and  being  affected  by  other  substances. 

In  order  to  action — to  change,  there  must  therefore  be  a  plu- 
rality of  bodies.  There  is  not,  so  far  as  we  can  discover,  a  self- 
acting  material  substance  in  nature.  Not  only  so,  but  in  order  to 
action,  to  change,  there  must  be  a  relation  between  the  properties 
of  the  bodies.  Oxygen  and  nitrogen,  for  instance,  would  not 
have  united,  unless  they  had  possessed  the  quality  of  a  mutual 
affinity — nay,  they  will  not  unite  except  in  certain  proportions, 
being  according  to  the  law  of  their  affinity.  All  action  or  change 
thus  originates  in  the  combined  operation  of  two  or  more  material 
substances,  and  implies  a  relation  between  their  properties  so  as 
to  admit  of  their  mutual  action.  A  material  substance  existing 
alone  in  the  universe,  had  not  produced  any  effects.  Give  us  two 
material  substances,  and  effects  may  follow.  Give  us  these  sub- 
stances in  a  relation  suited  to  their  properties,  and  effects  will  fol- 
low. All  changes,  all  effects  do  thus  proceed  from  the  properties 
of  two  or  more  substances,  these  substances  having  a  relation  to 
each  other  which  enables  their  properties  to  act. 

When  it  is  said  that  matter  is  passive  and  dependent,  every 
one  feels  that  there  is  a  truth  announced  which  at  once  com- 

*  The  conclusions  of  metaphysical  philosophy  are  thus  given  by  Sir  William  Ham- 
ilton. "The  necessary  constituents  of  our  notion  of  matter,  the  primary  qualities  of 
bodies,  are  thus  all  evolved  from  the  two  Catholic  conditions  of  matter — (1)  the  occu- 
pying space,  and  (2)  the  being  contained  in  space.  Of  these,  the  former  affords  (A) 
trinal  extension,  explicated  again  into  (1)  divisibility;  (2)  size,  containing  under  it 
density  or  rarity;  (3)  figure;  and  (B)  ultimate  incompressibility ;  while  the  latter 
gives  (A)  mobility,  and  (B)  situation."  "The  primary  qualities  of  matter  thus  de- 
velop themselves  out  of  the  original  datum  of  substance  occupying  space." — Disserta. 
tions,  Note  D,  §  2,  of  Hamilton's  Edition  of  Reid's  Essays. 


90  GENERAL    LAWS. 

mends  itself  to  the  judgment.  On  the  other  hand,  Leibnitz  and 
a  class  of  speculators  increasing  in  the  present  day,  endeavor 
to  demonstrate  that  matter  is  active.  May  not  both  views  con- 
tain partial  truth?  Is  there  not  a  double  truth  to  furnish  a  rec- 
onciliation ? 

We  believe  the  whole  truth  to  lie  in  the  double  doctrine  that 
matter  has  inherent  active  properties,  but  that  these  properties  are 
of  such  a  kind  that  they  cannot  act  unless  there  is  a  proper  re- 
lation adjusted  for  them.  Each  separate  substance,  viewed  per 
se,  is  inert,  and  will  continue  in  the  state  in  which  it  happens  to 
be  till  operated  upon  ab  extra.  In  order  to  action,  there  must 
therefore  be  two  or  more  bodies,  having  relation  to  each  other  in 
respect  of  their  properties.  In  order  to  beneficial  action,  there 
must  be  a  skilfully  arranged,  and  we  believe  divinely  appointed 
relation  of  bodies  to  one  another.  In  respect  of  its  properties  as 
in  exercise,  matter  is  active,  it  has  a  virtus,  (this  is  the  word 
which  Leibnitz*  uses  as  explanatory  of  his  meaning,),  and  we  be- 
lieve that  it  would  be  as  irreligious  as  it  is  unphilosophical  to  deny 
this  its  inherent  power.  "  In  that  great  system,"  says  Brown, 
"  which  we  call  the  universe,  all  things  are  what  they  are  in  con- 
sequence of  God's  primary  will ;  but  if  they  were  wholly  incapable 
of  affecting  anything,  they  would  virtually  themselves  be  as  no- 
thing.'^ But  then  in  order  to  the  exercise  of  this  their  capacity, 
there  needs  to  be  an  adjustment ;  and  in  order  to  its  beneficial 
exercise,  there  is  required  a  beneficial  arrangement,  made,  we 
believe,  by  the  same  Being  who  imparted  to  it  the  capacity 
itself. 

It  follows  that  all  causes,  so  far  as  they  are  material,  must  be 
complex.  An  effect  cannot  be  the  result  of  a  single  substance  or 
a  single  property,  but  of  two  or  more  substances  with  their  prop- 
erties, and  these  in  a  relation  to  each  other  admitting  of  their 
mutual  action.  We  thus  perceive  that  in  all  inquiry  into  causes, 
we  should  seek  for  the  properties  of  two  substances  at  the  least, 
and  a  condition  or  conditions  enabling  them  to  act.  Until  we 
have  determined  this,  we  have  not  ascertained  the  true  cause,  or 
that  which  will  again  or  forever  produce  the  same  effects.  We 
are  accustomed  to  say,  that  the  same  cause  in  similar  circum- 
stances will  always  produce  the  same  effects.  The  axiom  is  so 

*  See  Lettre  iv.  (Euvres,  par  M.  A.  Jacques,  Prem.  Ser.     There  are  curious  dis- 
cussions in  the  whole  of  the  lesser  works  of  Leibnitz, 
f  Brown  on  Cause  and  Effect.    P.  1,  §  5,  p.  105,  3d  ed. 


GENERAL    LAWS.  91 

far  correct,  but  it  is  loose  and  undefined,  and  does  not  become 
rigidly  correct,  till  we  embrace  the  circumstances  in  it,  or  give  an 
explanation  of  what  constitutes  the  similar  circumstances,  and 
make  it  assume  this  form,  that  the  same  material  substances, 
bearing  the  same  relation  in  respect  of  their  properties,  always 
produce  the  same  effects.  It  is  only  when  the  maxim  takes  this 
form  that  it  becomes  philosophically  accurate  and  practically 
useful.  As  long  as  it  exists  simply  in  the  looser  form,  we  lose 
ourselves  in  determining  what  it  is  that  constitutes  similar  cir- 
cumstances.* 

We  are  now  in  a  position  to  understand  what  is  meant  by 
general  laws.  We  may  mean  three  different  things  which  ought 
to  be  carefully  distinguished. 

FIRST,  BY  GENERAL  LAWS  is  OFTEN  MEANT  THE  PROPER- 
TIES OF  BODIES,  or  their  power  of  producing  changes  on  each 
other ;  as,  for  instance,  that  property  of  matter  by  which  it  at- 
tracts other  matter,  or  that  property  of  oxygen  by  which  it  com- 
bines chemically  with  carbon  in  certain  proportions.  In  using  the 
phrase  m  this  sense,  we  must  always  remember  that  these  proper- 
ties, in  order  to  action,  require  an  adjustment  of  two  or  more  sub- 
stances to  each  other. 

SECONDLY,  THE  PHRASE  "  GENERAL  LAWS"  MAY  DENOTE 
THE  CONNECTION  BETWEEN  CAUSE  AND  EFFECT,  OR  THE  AC- 
TION OF  TWO  OR  MORE  SUBSTANCES,  SO  ADJUSTED  AS  TO  PRO- 
DUCE EFFECTS.  The  phrase  is  most  frequently  applied  in  this 
sense  in  those  cases  in  which  the  substances  are  so  adjusted  as  to 
produce  a  succession  of  the  same  effects.  It  is  only  in  the  sense 
now  before  us  that  we  can  speak  with  any  propriety  of  the  action 
of  a  general  law.  Let  it  be  observed,  that  such  a  law,  when  in 
continued  action,  implies  the  continued  relation  of  two  or  more 
substances  to  each  other. 


*  Mr.  John  S.  Mill,  in  his  very  able  work  on  Logic,  has  seen  the  defect  in  the  com- 
mon statements,  but  has  not  discovered  the  proper  rectification.  "  The  statement  of 
the  cause  is  incomplete,  unless  in  some  shape  or  other  we  introduce  all  the  conditions. 
A  man  takes  mercury,  goes  out  of  doors  and  catches  cold.  We  say  perhaps  that  the 
cause  of  his  taking  cold  was  exposure  to  the  air.  It  is  clear,  however,  that  his  hav- 
ing taken  mercury  may  have  been  a  necessary  condition  of  his  catching  cold ;  and 
though  it  might  consist  with  usage  to  say  that  the  cause  of  his  attack  was  exposure 
to  the  air,  to  be  accurate  we  ought  to  say  that  the  cause  was  exposure  to  air  while 
under  the  effect  of  mercury."  (Vol.  i.  p.  400,  2d  ed.)  The  true  cause  here  was  the 
body  in  a  particular  state — that  is,  under  mercury — and  the  air  in  a  particular  state ; 
and  the  co-existence  of  the  two  is  necessary  to  the  production  of  the  effect. 


92  GENERAL    LAWS. 

THIRDLY,   THE  PHRASE   is   OFTEN   EMPLOYED  TO  DENOTE 

A  GENERALIZED  SET  OF  FACTS  IN  REGARD  TO  CERTAIN  OB- 
JECTS AND  EVENTS  THAT  RESEMBLE  EACH  OTHER,  AND  SO 

CAN  BE  PUT  IN  THE  SAME  CLASS.  We  have  observed,  for  in- 
stance, that  all  quadrupeds  are  mammalia,  and  that  children  are 
of  the  same  species  as  their  parents  ;  and  in  announcing  these 
facts,  we  often  call  them  general  laws.  But  let  it  be  observed. 
that  using  the  term  in  this  sense,  we  cannot  speak  of  the  action 
of  a  general  law,  for  the  law  is  of  the  mere  nature  of  a  genoial 
fact,  having  no  reference  to  action  or  production. 

It  is  of  the  utmost  moment  that  we  be  aWe  to  separate  these- 
three  things.  To  some  extent  connected,  in  that  they  all  imply 
order,  they  differ  in  other,  and  these  important  respects.  The 
first  may  be  called  the  properties  of  matter — properties  capable 
of  action  only  when  certain  needful  conditions  are  fulfilled.  The 
second  are  causes,  or  these  properties  in  actual  operation,  in  con- 
sequence of  their  conditions  of  action  being  furnished.  The  third 
are  mere  general  facts,  or  facts  resembling  each  other  in  such  a 
way  as  to  enable  us  to  class  them  together.  In  distinguishing 
them,  they  might  be  characterized  by  the  names  now  employed, 
or  by  others  that  are  synonymous. 

In  a  loose  way,  it  may  be  proper  enough  to  call  the.n  all  by 
one  name,  as  significant  of  the  order  that  reigns  in  the  world  ; 
but  in  doing  so,  there  is  always  a  risk  of  our  sliding  unconsciously 
from  the  one  meaning  to  the  other,  and  predicating  of  one  what 
is  true  only  of  another,  or  of  all  what  is  true  only  of  one.  If  these 
distinctions  had  been  kept  in  view,  we  should  never  have  heard 
of  gravitation  or  any  other  property  of  matter  being  exalted  into 
an  inherently  active  principle,  capable  of  creating  or  sustaining 
the  universe ;  for  it  would  have  been  seen,  that  the  properties  of 
natural  substances  require  certain  conditions  to  be  fulfilled  in  order 
to  action.  It  would  have  been  seen  at  once  that  all  action  im- 
plies adjustment,  all  operation  of  cause  and  effect  the  existence  of 
similar  circumstances,  and  that  general  effects  imply  a  continu- 
ance of  the  same  adjusted  circumstances.  Nor  would  we  have 
heard  of  a  mere  general  fact  being  used  to  explain  the  production 
of  any  phenomenon.  There  is  an  important  class  of  the  sciences, 
which  may  be  called  the  classificatory,  embracing  the  various 
branches  of  natural  history  ;  and  in  them  the  laws  are  of  that  de- 
scription which  we  arranged  as  the  THIRD,  being  mere  general 
facts  observed  by  experience.  No  correct  thinker  could  ever  fall 


GENERAL    LAWS.  93 

into  the  enormous  rlunder  of  the  author  of  the  Veistiges  of  Crea- 
tion, and  speak  of  such  general  facts,  requiring  themselves  to  be 
accounted  for,  as  accounting  for  the  production  of  the  universe. 

The  sciences  to  which  we  have  now  referred,  are  satisfied  when 
they  can  group  objects  into  classes  in  the  manner  referred  to. 
But  all  investigation  into  production  or  change  carries  us  at  last 
to  substances  with  their  qualities.  Scientific  investigation  has 
gone,  we  apprehend,  to  its  farthest  point,  when  it  has  discovered 
the  substances  and  qualities,  and  the  conditions  needful  to  their 
operation.  The  mind  will  not  rest  till  it  reaches  this  limit ;  for 
it  knows  that  all  given  phenomena  must  proceed  from  certain 
bodies,  having  fixed  properties,  which  it  is  bent  upon  discovering. 
Having  got  this  length,  it  should  feel  that  it  can  go  no  farther. 
In  astronomy,  we  arrive  at  last  at  gravitation,  and  the  relation  of 
the  celestial  bodies  which  enables  that  property  to  act,  and  we  feel 
that  inquiry  must  now  cease.  In  chemistry,  we  ascertain  that  a 
certain  compound  is  composed  of  two  or  more  elementary  sub- 
stances, which  unite  according  to  a  certain  rule,  and  the  mind 
must  rest  here  forever,  for  it  can  get  no  farther. 

These  views  might  be  usefully  applied  to  check  all  those  rash 
conclusions,  which  men  of  science,  falsely  so  called,  have  been 
drawing  in  regard  to  the  formation  and  past  history  of  the  world, 
which  they  would  explain  by  referring  them  to  general  laws, 
these  general  laws  being  the  mere  generalized  facts  of  natural 
history.  Truly  these  persons  know  not  what  they  mean  by 
general  laws,  though  no  phrase  is  so  frequently  in  their  mouths. 
To  refer  a  phenomenon  to  a  law,  in  the  sense  in  which  they  use 
the  word,  is  merely  to  show  that  certain  other  phenomena  re- 
semble it  in  some  respects,  but  does  not  furnish  an  explanation  of 
its  production — nay,  it  brings  instead  under  our  notice  certain 
other  phenomena,  all  requiring  to  be  explained,  as  to  the  manner 
of  their  production.  The  man  who  talks  of  phenomena  being 
produced  by  a  general  law  without  a  cause,  and  that  a  cause  in 
a  given  substance,  is  using  language  to  which  he  can  attach  no 
distinct  meaning,  or  a  meaning  which  receives  no  support  from 
what  we  see  in  the  actual  universe.  Events,  whether  we  are 
or  are  not  able  to  arrange  them  in  a  law — that  is,  a  class — have 
all  a  producing  cause  different  from  themselves.  The  mind  is 
not  satisfied  when  it  is  said  of  the  production  of  a  race  of  animals, 
for  instance,  that  it  happens  according  to  a  general  law  of  pro- 
gression, or  any  other  general  law,  when  no  cause  is  pointed  out. 


94  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

We  are  entitled  to  demand  of  M.  Comtey  and  the  author  of  the 
Vestiges  of  Creation,  that  they  point  out  a  cause  in  a  physical 
substance  of  those  products  which  they  think  they  have  suffi- 
ciently explained,  when  they  have  arranged  them  in  a  class. 
When  we  are  constrained  to  acknowledge,  in  regard  to  any 
phenomenon,  that  it  could  not  have  had  a  cause  in  a  material 
substance,  the  mind  will  not  rest  till  it  calls  in  the  fiat  of  the 
Creator. 

But  it  is  more  to  our  present  purpose  to  impress  it  upon  the 
mind,  that  in  every  material  cause  there  is  the  presence  of  two  or 
more  substances  with  their  properties,  and  an  adjusting  of  these 
as  the  condition  of  their  operation.  It.  is  this  circumstance  which 
renders  matter  so  inert  in  itself,  and  so  dependent  on  the  Governor 
of  the  world.  This  fact,  too,  constrains  us  to  see  the  hand  of  God 
in  every  operation  of  matter,  because  as  the  condition  of  that 
operation  there  is  required  a  nicely  contrived  adjustment.  The 
argument  in  behalf  of  the  existence  of  God,  derived  from  adapta- 
tion and  contrivance,  is  thus  widened  and  rendered  as  extensive 
as  the  action  of  the  physical  universe. 

In  order  to  the  production  of  any  effect,  there  must  be  substances, 
in  an  adjusted  relation  to  each  other.  In  order  to  the  production 
of  a  succession  of  general  effects,  these  substances  must  continue 
to  bear  the  same  relation,  or  the  relation  must  be  recurrent  or 
repeating. 

These  views,  however,  will  be  better  comprehended  after  taking 
a  survey  of  the  considerations  to  be  advanced  in  the  succeeding 
section. 

ILLUSTRATIVE  NOTE.— RELATION  BETWEEN  CAUSE  AND  EFFECT. 

In  offering  some  remarks  on  this  subject,  we  are  anxious  that 
it  should  be  understood  that  we  are  speaking  solely  of  the  nature 
of  the  relation  between  cause  and  effect,  and  not  at  all  of  the 
mental  principle  by  which  we  come  to  discover  that  relation — of 
the  objective  relation,  and  not  at  all  of  the  subjective  idea.  Many 
errors  have  arisen  from  confounding  these  two  things ;  and  these 
errors  appear  again  and  again  in  the  speculations  of  those  who 
have  derived  their  views  directly  or  indirectly  from  the  great 
German  metaphysician,  Kant.  Upon  the  latter,  or  the  internal 
principle,  the  German  school  of  philosophy  has  thrown  some  light ; 
but  we  are  at  present  speaking  of  another  topic  which  they  have 


RELATION    BETWEEN    CAUSE    AND    EFFECT.  95 

contrived  to  confuse — the  real  relation  between  cause  and  effect  in 
the  external  world. 

"  Every  effect  has  a  cause,"  is  the  axiom  ;  but  the  words  cause 
and  effect  are  ambiguous,  particularly  the  word  effect,  The  apho- 
rism understood  in  one  sense  is  a  mere  truism  or  identical  propo- 
sition, and  may  mean  nothing  more  than  that  every  "  effect,"  that 
is,  every  phenomenon  which  has  a  phenomenon  before  it  has  a 
phenomenon  before  it.  But  the  proposition  is  more  than  a  truism. 
What  more  is  meant  by  it  ?  What  is  the  exact  truth  set  forth  ? 

Dr.  T.  Brown,  the  most  ingenious  analyst  of  the  order  of  suc- 
cession of  the  states  of  the  mind  in  these  latter  days,  (we  use  this 
guarded  language  because  we  have  doubts  of  his  success  in  ex- 
plaining the  state  of  mind  themselves,}  following  out  and  correct- 
ing the  speculations  of  Hume,  has  proven  to  a  demonstration  that 
there  is  and  can  be  nothing  intermediate  between  cause  and  effect. 
He  has  shown  that  cause  and  effect  are  joined  as  the  links  of  a 
chain,  coming  into  immediate  contact,  and  with  nothing  between. 
In  doing  so,  he  has  cleared  away  much  cumbrous  and  confusing 
error — but  has  he  established  and  clearly  defined  the  positive  truth? 
With  a  mind  of  unequalled  sharpness  of  edge,  he  could  cut  into 
parts  that  which  others  thought  to  be  indivisible ;  but  it  may  be 
doubted  whether  that  edge,  through  its  excessive  keenness,  was 
not  sometimes  bent  back  when  directed  to  certain  solid  matters, 
which  require  to  be  inspected  and  described  rather  than  to  be 
divided  or  analyzed.* 

He  endeavors  to  prove  that  cause  and  effect  have  no  other  con- 
nection than  this — that  the  one  is  the  invariable  antecedent,  and 
the  other  the  invariable  consequent.  We  believe  that  no  one  dis- 
putes the  existence  of  the  invariable  sequence,  as  at  least  one  ele- 
ment in  the  relation.  But  it  is  not  so  universally  acknowledged 
that  there  is  nothing  else.  The  majority  of  scientific  inquirers, 
including  such  distinguished  men  as  Herschell,  Whewell,  and 
Brougham,t  and  all  the  metaphysicians  of  the  German  and  Ger- 
man-French schools,  have  arrayed  themselves  against  Brown's 
doctrine.  Most  persons  unable,  as  they  acknowledge,  to  say  where 
the  deficiency  lies,  have  felt  that  the  theory  is  bare  and  unsatisfac- 

*  The  language  of  Seneca  (de  benef.,)  applied  to  Chrysippus  the  Stoic,  may  be 
applied  to  Dr.  Brown, — "  Magnum  mehercule  virum,  sed  tamen  Graecuin,  cujus 
acumen  nimis  tenue  retunditur,  et  in  se  ssepe  replicatur  etiam  cum  agere  aliquid 
pungit  non  perforat." 

f  See  Herschell's  Treatise  on  Astronomy,  Whewell's  Philosophy  of  the  Inductire 
Sciences,  and  Lord  Brougham's  Natural  Theology. 


96 


ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 


tory ;  and  that  if  it  does  not  miss  the  truth,  it  does  not  at  least 
give  a  full  exhibition  of  it.  It  is  possible  that,  in  the  theory  under 
review,  Dr.  Brown  may  have  got  the  truth,  but  not  the  whole 
truth. 

Dr.  Brown  has  shown  that  abstract  terms  are  generic  names, 
denoting  all  things  which  agree  in  certain  respects,  and  indicating 
the  points  of  agreement.  Let  us  apply  this  principle  to  what 
Herschell  calls  the  "widest  of  alt  generalizations ;"  let  us  apply  it 
to  the  phrases  cause  and  effect,  or  the  supposed  explanatory 
synonyms  of  Brown,  invariable  antecedents  and  consequence. 
When  we  assert  that  every  effect  has  a  cause,  so  far  as  we  do  not 
play  upon  words,  or  utter  a  mere  truism,  we  are  affirming  some- 
thing in  regard  to  existing  things.  Now,  we  always  rejoice  to 
bring  down  abstractions  to  actual  objects.  When  we  do  so,  we 
feel  that  we  have  a  surer  footing  to  stand  on.  Let  us  come  to  ex- 
isting things,  and  examine  them  with  the  view  of  determining 
what  is  really  said  of  them,  when  we  affirm  that  every  effect  has 
a  cause. 

Do  we  mean  that  every  existing  thing  has  a  consequent,  and 
every  existing  thing  an  antecedent,  and  both  necessary,  to  use  the 
old  phraseology,  or  invariable,  to  use  that  of  Brown  ?  Does  it 
mean  that  every  existing  thing  (A)  is  succeeded  by  an  existing 
thing  (B ;)  and  that  every  existing  thing  (B)  is  preceded  by  an 
existing  thing  (A  ;)  and  that  this  existing  thing  (A)  will  always  be 
followed  by  ihe  existing  thing  (B :)  and  vice  versa  that  this  given 
existing  thing  (B)  has  always  the  same  existing  thing  (A)  before  it? 
We  doubt  much  if  the  mind  is  prepared  at  once  to  admit  so  broad 
un  axiom  as  this,  however  expressed.  Suppose  there  were  nothing 
in  the  universe  but  some  simple  unformed  substance,  such  as  a 
piece  of  earth  or  metal,  would  it  have  been  followed  by  something 
else — or  could  we,  on  the  mere  inspection  of  such  a  substance, 
have  argued  that  there  must  have  been  something  before  it?  Dr. 
Brown  gives  a  clear  and,  as  it  appears  to  us,  right  answer  to  this 
question,  when  he  says,  "that  matter,  as  an  unformed  mass  ex- 
isting without  relation  of  parts,  could  not  of  itself  have  suggested 
the  notion  of  a  Creator,  since  in  every  hypothesis  something  ma- 
terial or  mental  must  have  existed  uncaused,  and  mere  existence, 
therefore,  is  not  necessarily  a  mark  of  previous  causation,  unless 
we  take  for  granted  an  infinite  series  of  causes."  * 

"Every  effect  has  a  cause,"  is  the  aphorism.     What  do  we 

*  Phil,  of  Hum.  Mind,  Lect  92. 


RELATION    BETWEEN    CAUSE    AND    EFFECT.  97 

mean  by  an  effect?  If  we  analyze  it,  it  will  always  be  found  to 
imply  a  change,  or  something*  new.  Dr.  Brown  admits  that  an 
unformed  mass  could  not  of  itself  have  suggested  the  idea  of  a 
cause,  and  that  there  must  be  something  uncaused.  But  let  this 
mass  be  seen  springing  into  being,  or  let  it  be  seen  assuming  a 
new  form,  and  the  idea  of  a  cause  is  at  once  suggested.  We  must 
limit  the  general  maxim  accordingly.  When  we  say  that  every 
effect  has  a  cause,  we  do  not  mean  that  every  existing  thing  has 
an  antecedent,  invariable,  or  necessary.  There  is  change  implied 
in  the  very  conception  of  effect,  it  is  something  effected,  something 
new,  something  which  did  not  exist  before  or  put  in  a  new  state. 
Whenever  such  a  phenomenon  is  brought  under  cognizance,  the 
mind  rises  intuitively  to  the  belief  in  a  cause. 

Having  endeavored  to  limit  and  define  what  is  meant  by  an 
effect,  let  us  now  attempt  to  determine  what  is  meant  by  a  cause. 

Looking  as  before  at  existing  things,  we  find  substances  with 
their  several  properties.  Dr.  Brown  has  endeavored  to  show  that 
substance  is  nothing  but  "the  co-existence  of  certain  qualities."* 
Into  this  curious  speculation  we  do  not  feel  ourselves  called  to 
enter.  We  assume  the  existence  of  substances,  material  and 
spiritual,  possessing  their  several  properties,  or  if -any  prefer  the 
statement,  composed  of  their  several  properties  cohering  together.. 
Now,  a  cause  is  always  to  be  found  in  some  existing  thing,  or  in 
a  substance  spiritual  or  material,  simple  or  compound.  In  pro- 
ducing its  effects,  that  substance  produces  a  new  substance,  or  a 
change  upon  some  existing  substance ;  and  we  are  led  to  the  con- 
clusion that  existing  things,  in  producing  new  existences,  or 
changes  on  old  existences,  act  according  to  certain  definite  rules,, 
which  it  is  the  business  of  experience  to  discover.  The  same 
existing  thing,  in  the  same  state,  is  always  followed  by  the  same 
change  in  that  existing  thing,  or  in  some  other  existing  thing. 
The  same  existing  substance  in  the  same  state  is  thus  always  fol- 
lowed by  the  same  change,  and  vice  versa  the  change  always 
presupposes  the  same  pre-existing  substance. 

When  we  discover,  what  are  the  precise  changes  or  productions 
resulting  from  a  given  substance,  we  call  this  a  property  of  the 
substance,  and  we  know  that  this  substance  in  the  given  state  will 
.ever  produce  this  change  or  exercise  this  quality.  It  is  the  office 
of  observation  and  experience  to  discover  the  properties  of  objects. 

We  are  now  in  circumstances  to  define  more  accurately  the 

*  Note  C,  p.  498. 

7 


98  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

ideas  contained  in  the  words  cause  and  effect.  There  is  the  idea 
of  universal  sequence,  but  there  is  something  more  definite.  Dr, 
Brown  challenges  those  who  affirm  that  there  is  something  more 
than  invariable  antecedence  and  consequence,  to  say  what  it  is. 
We  answer  the  call,  and  affirm,  that  in  a  cause  there  is  a  sub- 
stance acting  according  to  a  definite  rule.  Again,  in  every  effect 
there  is  a  change  or  a  new  object.  We  are  far  from  saying  that 
Dr.  Brown  denies  what  we  now  state.  There  are  passages  in  his 
work  which  show  that  he  might  have  been  driven  to  admit  all 
that  we  now  affirm ;  but  still  we  think  that  he  has  not  fully 
brought  out  the  whole  truth.  Had  he  done  so,  we  are  convinced 
that  his  theory  would  have  recommended  itself  more  readily  to 
the  mind,  because  it  would  have  been  felt  to  accord  with  our  cher- 
ished convictions. 

Cousin  has  discovered  what  we  now  refer  to  as  existing  in  the 
causes  which  reside  in  the  human  mind.  "The  internal  principle 
of  causation,  in  developing  itself  in  its  acts,  retains  that  which 
makes  it  the  principle,  and  the  cause,  and  is  not  absorbed  in  its 
effects."*  But  he  has  not  observed,  (because,  like  all  who  have 
become  involved  in  the  abstractions  of  Kant,  he  has  fixed  his  at- 
tention too  much  on  the  subjective,)  that  the  same  remark  is  true 
of  material  substances ;  and  that  in  producing  their  effects  they 
retain  the  property  which  they  exercised,  and  are  ready  anew  to 
produce  the  same  effects. 

Dr.  Brown  has  shown,  beyond  the  possibility  of  a  refutation, 
that  in  the  production  of  changes  there  is  truly  nothing  but  the 
substances  that  change  and  are  changed.  Mix  them  as  we  pleasey 
"  the  substances  that  exist  in  a  train  of  phenomena  are  still,  and 
must  always  be,  the  whole  constituents  of  the  train. "t  But  he 
has  not  shown  so  fully  as  he  might,  how  much  is  implied  in  these 
substances.  The  German  metaphysicians  are  right  in  affirming 
that  power  is  implied  in  our  very  idea  of  substance;  and  Dr. 
Brown,  in  one  passage  admits,  though  casually,  the  same  thing 
when  he  says,  "  all  this  regularity  of  succession  is  assumed  in 
our  very  notion  of  substance  as  existing."  t  These  philosophers 
might  have  farther  affirmed  that  there  is  power  in  the  very  nature 
of  a  substance  as  well  as  in  our  idea  of  it.  This  power,  these 
properties  of  substances,  are  permanently  in  them,  and  ready  to 
be  exercised  at  all  times.  With  the  exception  of  those  who  deny 

*  Lefon  V.,  (Cours,  1828.) 

f  Brown  on  C^use  and  Effect,  p.  29.  \  Do.,  p.  143. 


RELATION    BETWEEN    CAUSE    AND    EFFECT.  9£ 

Ihe  existence  of  an  external  world,  all  admit  that  properties  are  of  an 
abiding  nature,  and  constantly  resident  in  the  substance.  We  thus 
arrive  at  a  power  in  nature,  constant  and  permanent,  and  ever  ready 
to  be  exercised.  We  cannot,  perhaps,  speak  of  a  cause  as  existing 
when  not  exercised  5  but  we  can  most  assuredly  speak  of  a  power 
abiding1,  whether  exercised  or  not,  that  power  abiding  in  every  sub- 
stance that  comes  under  our  notice,  and  in  the  very  nature  of  the 
substance  itself,  as  it  is  implied  in  the  very  idea  of  substance.* 

Taking  these  views  along  with  us,  we  free  ourselves  from  the 
impression  left  in  reading  such  a  work  as  that  of  Brown  on  Cause 
end  Effect,  that  impression  being  one  of  events  proceeding  in 
pairs  or  couples,  the  latter  member  of  one  couple  forming  the  first 
member  of  the  next.  When  we  introduce  substance  and  quali- 
ties, the  idea  of  a  chain  is  now  got  rid  of,  with  all  its  offensive 
and  misleading  associations,  and  we  find  ourselves  instead,  in  the 
heart  of  multiplied  harmonies,  requiring  a  divine  skill  in  order  to 
their  maintenance,  and  exhibiting  that  skill  in  every  department 
•of  God's  works. 

The  doctrine  now  expounded  is  fitted,  we  conceive,  to  clear  up 
and  strengthen  the  argument  in  behalf  of  the  existence  of  God, 
The  axiom  that  every  effect  has  a  cause,  stated  in  this  loose  form, 
seems  to  involve  us  in  several  difficulties  in  regard  to  the  Theistic 
argument.  The  sceptic,  proceeding  upon  it,  would  shut  us  up  to 
the  alternative — of  affirming  that  every  existence  has  a  cause,  and 
thence  he  would  drive  us  to  the  conclusion  that  God  himself  must 
have  a  cause,  and  that  there  is  an  infinite  succession  of  causes ; 
•or  if  we  limit  our  assertion,  and  say  that  every  existence  has  not 
a  cause,  it  is  immediately  hinted  that  the  world  maybe  uncaused, 
Now,  we  have  rid  ourselves  from  the  horns  of  this  dilemma  by  the 
view  which  we  have  given  both  of  effect  and  of  cause.  An* 
*;  effect"  involves  something  new — -a  change  in  our  very  idea  of  it. 
Ifi  is  in  regard  to  such  a  phenomenon  that  we  infer  that  it  must 
have  a  cause — and  such  every  one  admits  are  all  the  phenomena 
i»  the  world.  We  are  warranted,  then,  to  conclude,  in  regard  to 

'**  Of  all  persons  Dr.  Brown  should  be  the  readiest  to  grant  this,  as  he  supposes 
that  substance  is  the  mere  co-existence  of  qualities ;  and  it  follows  that  if  qualities 
were  to  cease,  then  substance  would  cease  also.  There  are  passages  in  which  he 
seems  to  acknowledge  all  that  we  say  in  the  text,  as  when  he  says,  "that  substances 
abide,  and  qualities  abide ;"  and  that  "qualities  are  just  another  name  for  the  power 
of  affecting  other  substances,"  (p.  142.)  Yet,  in  direct  contradiction,  he  affirms, 
<p.  176,)  "that  power  is  not  something  latent  that  exists  whether  exercised  or  not — 
there  is  strictly  no  power  that  is  not  exerted," 


100  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE, 

all  such  phenomena,  that  they  must  have  a  cause.  We  thence 
rise  through  a  succession  of  causes  to  the  purpose  of  an  intelli- 
gent Being.  We  are  required  to  go  no  farther,  according  to  the 
explanation  of  cause  which  we  have  given.  All  power,  we  have 
seen,  resides  in  a  substance,  and  we  trace  all  the  instances  of  con- 
trivance in  the  world  to  God  as  a  substance.  We  now  rest  in-  an 
unchanging  spiritual  Being,  capable  of  producing  all  the  effects 
which  we  see  in  the  universe. 

But  to  return  to  the  subject  discussed  in  the  text,  we  find  in  the 
examination  of  material  causes  that  they  always  imply  two  or 
more  distinct  bodies,  as  do  also  the  effects.  There  is  an  incon- 
ceivable amount  of  confusion  in  the  common  conceptions  on  this 
subject.  When  a  hammer  is  made  to  strike  a  stone  and  break  it, 
the  cause  is  not,  as  is  commonly  supposed,  the  stroke  of  the  ham- 
mer, and  the  effect  the  fracture  of  the  stone.  The  cause,  properly 
speaking,  consists  of  the  hammer  and  stone  in  a  particular  state 
and  relation,  and  the  effect,  the  hammer  and  £tone  in  another 
state.  These  are  the  real  invariable,  antecedent,  and  consequent 
— the  cause  tied  forever  to  its  effect.  The  cause  always  con- 
sists of  a  plurality  of  substances  in  a  certain  state,  and  the  effect 
consists  of  the  same  substances  in  another  state.  In  order  to  the 
action,  or  rather  the  existence  of  a  cause,  these  substances  must 
be  in  a  certain  relation,  so  as  to  admit  of  the  operation  of  the 
powers  or  qualities  residing  in  them  ;  and  it  is  only  when  they 
exist  in  this  relation  that  the  effect  will  be  produced.  We  may 
have  occasion  to  show,  at  a  future  stage  of  our  inquiries,  how  the 
operation  of  mental  causes  differs  in  this  respect  from  material 
causes,  in  that  the  former  requires  the  presence  of  only  one  sub- 
stance, the  one  indivisible  substance — mind  with  its  faculties  ;  and 
how  the  independent  and  self-acting  power  of  mind  is  one  of  its 
most  striking  properties,  and  that  by  which  it  is  pre-eminently  dis- 
tinguished from  matter.  Meanwhile,  let  us  carry  along  with  us 
the  general  truth,  that  in  all  material  action  there  must  be  present 
more  than  one  substance,  and  all  the  substances,  in  an  adjusted 
relation,  admitting  of  their  action. 

QUERY.—  Does  it  not  seem  as  if  some  of  the  laws  of  motion  were  but  partial  state- 
ments of  more  comprehensive  laws?  A  body  continues  in  the  state  in  which  if 
ie,  whether  of  motion  or  of  rest,  forever,  unless  operated  upon  ab  extra.  Is  not  thisv 
but  a  part  of  the  more  general  law,  that  matter  is  inert,  in  regard  to  all  its  proper- 
ties, till  operated  upon  by  something  foreign  to  itself? 

Is  not  the  second  law  of  motion,  that  of  action  being  equal  to  reaction,  just  a  larger 


ADJUSTMENT    OF    THE    MATERIAL    SUBSTANCES.  101 

law  seen  under  a  particular  aspect — this  second  larger  law  being  the  positive,  and 
the  other  before  considered,  the  negative  ?  In  order  to  the  production  of  any  effect* 
chemical  as  well  as  mechanical,  there  is  required  the  presence  of  two  or  more  sub- 
stances with  their  qualities,  and  in  the  production  of  the  effects,  both  bodies  are 
changed,  or  rather  the  effect  consists  in  the  change  made  on  the  two  bodies.  That 
&ody  which  changes  another  is  itself  changed,  and  that  which  is  itself  changed 
changes  that  by  which  it  is  changed.  Not  only  so,  but  the  change  in  both  bodies  is 
of  the  same  description  ;  if  chemical  in  the  one  it  is  chemical  in  the  other,  if  mechan- 
ical in  the  one  it  is  mechanical  in  the  other.  May  it  not  also  be  that  the  change  in 
the  one  is  equal  to  the  change  in  the  other,  and  thus  the  law  of  action  and  reaction 
be  extended  to  the  exercise  of  every  property  of  matter  ? 

If  so,  might  not  this  comprehensive  law  be  used  4o  explain  some  of  the  curious 
.phenomena  of  chemical  equivalents,  and  of  the  polarity  of  the  latent  powers  of  na- 
•ture  ? 

SECTION   II.— ADJUSTMENT  OF   THE  MATERIAL  SUBSTANCES,  WITH 
THEIR  PROPERTIES  TO  EACH  OTHER. 

Modern  science  has  attempted  to  number  the  elementary  ma- 
terial substances  in  nature,  and  declares  them  to  be  about  sixty. 
These  are  supposed,  by  their  combination,  to  produce  the  innumer- 
able substances  which  fall  under  our  notice. 

While  an  approximation  has  been  made  to  an  enumeration  of 
the  elementary  substances,  no  attempt  has  been  made  to  number 
the  properties  of  matter.  The  essential  properties  of  matter,  that 
is,  the  properties  found  in  matter  under  every  form,  have  been 
ascertained,  it  is  supposed  ;  but  the  separate  qualities  of  the  ele- 
mentary substances  have  not  been  determined,  and  no  one  has 
proposed  to  himself  the  task  of  denning  all  the  qualities  of  the 
compound  substances  in  the  animal,  the  vegetable,  and  the  mine- 
ral kingdoms.  Some  scientific  inquirers  have  regarded  them- 
selves as  nobly  employed  in  devoting  a  whole  lifetime  to  the 
examination  of  a  single  law,  and  have  been  rewarded  by  endless 
fame  on  account  of  the  discoveries  which  they  have  made  regard- 
ing it.  Science  is  making  vigorous  efforts  to  master  the  whole 
domains  of  nature ;  but  its  investigations  are  ever  opening  new 
wonders,  of  the  existence  of  which  the  imagination  did  not  so 
much  as  dream.  In  every  part  of  nature  there  are  latent  powers 
at  work,  giving  intimations  by  signs  which  cannot  be  mistaken 
of  their  existence,  but  not  deigning  to  give  any  insight  into  their 
nature.  It  would  appear,  so  far  as  Faraday's  discoveries  have 
carried  science,  that  all  matter  is  subject  to  the  gravitating,  the 
cohesive,  the  chemical,  the  electric,  and  the  magnetic  forces. 
But  the  mind  feels  itself  burdened  and  oppressed  when  it  would 
•ondeavor  to  number  the  qualities  of  matter,  and  it  soon  gives  up 


X102  ADJUSTMENT    OF    THE    MATERIAL    SUBSTANCES, 

the  attempt  in  a  sense  of  utter  hopelessness.  At  a  subsequent 
part  of  this  Treatise  we  may  show  that  some  important  purposes 
are  served  in  the  divine  government  by  these  laws  being  so 
numerous  and  complicated. 

It  is  out  of  these  substances,  simple  and  compound,  with  their 
several  properties,  that  God  hath  constructed  the  visible  universe. 
We  speak  of  the  construction  of  the  universe  as  something  sep- 
arate from,  and  additional  to,  .the  simple  substances  and  pro- 
perties ;  for  it  is  possible  to  conceive  of  the  matter  of  the  universe 
and  the  laws  of  the  universe  being  the  same,  and  yet  the  universe 
being  different  from  the  existing  one,  seeing  that  these  powers  of 
matter,  instead  of  conspiring  and  co-operating,  might  have  only 
opposed  and  thwarted  each  other,  and  instead  of  order  there  would 
have  been  never-ending  confusion,  worse  than  the  chaos  which 
the  poets  describe. 

It  is  delightful  to  find  that,  at  this  part  of  our  inquiries,  we  can 
refer  to  one  who  combined  in  himself  qualities  which  are  often 
dissevered  in  others — the  popular  orator  and  scientific  inquirer, 
the  philosopher  and  divine,  uniting  simple  faith  with  the  boldest 
spirit  of  speculation,  standing  firmly  on  the  earth  while  he  meas- 
ures the'  heavens,  and  after  his  imagination  has  taken  the  widest 
excursions,  and  his  understanding  has  constructed  the  noblest 
theories,  ever  returning  to  sit  at  the  feet  of  his  Divine  teacher. 
Adopting  the  views  set  forth  in  those  portions  of  Dr.  Ghalmersr 
Bridge  water  Treatise  and  Natural  Theology,  in  which  he  treats 
of  what  he  calls  the  collocations  or  dispositions  of  matter,  we  hope 
to  be  able  to  give  them  a  greater  extension. 

There  are,  it  appears,  about  sixty  elementary  substances  in 
nature  with  their  separate  laws,  and  there  are  combinations  of 
these  elementary  substances,  and  properties  possessed  by  them,  so 
many  that  they  cannot  be  numbered,  and  so  diversified  that  they 
cannot  be  classified,  while  there  is  a  certain  room  in  boundless 
space  allowed  for  these  substances,  and  the  play  of  their  several 
qualities.  Now.  the  wisdom  of  God  is  specially  seen  in  the  ad- 
justment of  the  several  material  substances  with  their  properties 
to  each  other. 

Not  that  there  may  not  be  wisdom  exhibited  in  the  formation 
of  each  separate  substance  considered  in  itself,  and  in  the  prop- 
erties with  which  it  is  endowed.  Astronomers  have  asserted  that 
there  is  a  wonderful  beauty  discoverable  in  the  circumstance  that 
the  law  of  gravitation  varies  with  the  reciprocal  of  the  square  of 


WITH    THEIR    PROPERTIES    TO    EACH    OTHER.  103 

the  distance ;  and  it  is  certain  that  if  it  had  varied  according  to 
any  other  rule,  the  same  purposes  could  not  have  been  served  by 
:t  in  the  actual  mundane  system.  There  is  manifestly  a  wisdom 
shown  in  the  nature  and  properties  of  the  elementary  substances, 
some  of  them  being  at  the  common  temperature  of  the  earth, 
gaseous  and  singularly  pervading  and  permeating,  some  of  them 
being  fluid  and  easily  moved,  and  the  common  metals  being  as 
useful  in  consequence  of  their  solidity  and  coherence  as  the  gases 
are  in  virtue  of  their  elasticity  and  mobility.  But  admitting  all 
this,  we  still  affirm  that  it  is  chiefly  in  the  adaptation  of  these 
substances  and  laws  to  each  other  that  we  are  to  discover  the 
presence  and  the  wisdom  of  God. 

We  may  discover  the  wisdom  of  the  disposer  of  all  things  in 
the  adjustment  of  nature  in  respect  of  four  classes  of  relations. 
There  is  the  relation  of  bodies  in  respect  (1.)  of  their  PROPERTIES, 
(2.)  their  QUANTITY,  (3.)  of  SPACE,  and  (4.)  of  TIME.  It  may  be 
interesting  and  instructive  to  contemplate  some  examples  of  each 
of  these  classes.  Since  the  relations  here  referred  to  belong  to 
various  classes,  we  prefer  the  word  adjustment  or  adaptation  to 
collocation  or  disposition,  (the  words  employed  by  Dr.  Chalmers,) 
in  so  far  as  the  latter  direct  our  attention  merely  to  that  class 
which  originates  in  the  relations  of  space.* 

FIRST,  THERE  is  THE  ADJUSTMENT  OF  BODIES  IN  RESPECT 
OP  THEIR  PROPERTIES.  This  is  the  basis  of  all  the  other  ad- 
justments. 

Bodies  have  a  power  of  uniting  in  chemical  and  mechanical 
combination,  and,  again,  a  susceptibility  of  separation.  Each 
body  has  in  this  respect  its  owrn  properties  in  reference  to  other 
bodies.  Nature  is  sustained  by  their  harmonious  adaptations. 
But  in  order  to  their  operation,  the  bodies  must  have  a  relation  to 
each  other  in  respect  of  their  properties. 

Every  one  knows  how  needful  the  atmosphere  is  for  the  sus- 
taining of  animal  and  vegetable  life.  When  air  is  inhaled  by  a 
living  being,  its  oxygen  unites  with  the  carbon  of  the  blood  to 
produce  carbonic  acid  ;  and  the  combination,  being  a  kind  of 
combustion,  is  one  source  of  heat,  required  in  order  to  the  pres- 
ervation of  the  frame.  But  for  the  skilful  composition  of  the  at- 
mosphere, and  the  greater  disposition  of  oxygen  to  unite  with 

*  Mill  talks  of  the  aptly  selected  phrase  of  Dr.  Chalmers,  and  has  made  a  profit- 
able use  of  the  principle.  We  are  better  pleased  with  the  principle  than  with  the 
phrase  employed  to  express  it.  See  Mill's  Logic,  voL  i.  p.  549. 


104  ADJUSTMENT    OF    THE    MATERIAL    SUBSTANCES, 

carbon  than  with  nitrogen,  and  the  production  of  heat  by  the 
chemical  combination  of  carbon  and  cxygen,  it  is  evident  that 
animation  could  not  be  sustained.  It  appears  that  a  slight  change 
it>  the  composition  of  the  atmosphere,  or  even  the  chemical  in- 
stead of  the  mechanical  combination  of  its  two  elements,  would 
render  it  no  longer  capable  of  accomplishing  these  ends.  And  it 
is  by  a  most  skilfully  arranged  process  that  the  atmosphere, 
amidst  the  changes  which  it  undergoes  in  fulfilling  its  offices,  is 
still  enabled  to  retain  its  purity.  The  germination  of  plants,  and 
the  respiration  of  animals,  are  constantly  active  in  producing  car- 
bonic acid,  and  in  setting  nitrogen  free.  But  these  in  excess 
would  give  the  air  a  deadly  tendency,  and  this  is  prevented  by  a 
beautiful  provision,  whereby  the  carbon  of  the  carbonic  acid  is 
absorbed  by  plants  as  being  necessary  for  their  sustenance,  and 
in  the  absorption  the  oxygen  is  set  free  to  join  the  superfluous 
nitrogen  liberated  by  the  other  processes.  The  animal  and 
vegetable  kingdoms  are  thus  made  to  balance  and  sustain  each 
other;  but  this,  be  it  observed,  by  means  of  the  most  skilfully 
arranged  adjustment  of  the  properties  of  bodies  to  each  other. 

The  different  powers  which  substances  have  of  absorbing  and 
radiating  heat  also  furnishes  illustrations  of  the  skilful  adjust- 
ments with  which  nature  abounds.  The  grass  and  foliage  ab- 
sorb heat  in  the  summer  season  during  the  day,  and  again  radiate 
it  into  the  clear  atmosphere  at  night,  till  the  plants  are  so  reduced 
in  temperature  as  to  congeal  the  moisture  floating  in  the  air  into 
the  dew  necessary  to  refresh  them.  How  different  from  the  bar- 
ren rock  which  reflects  all  the  heat  that  falls  upon  it  for  the  good 
of  other  objects  that  require  it,  and  itself  absorbs  no  heat,  and 
therefore  receives  no  dew.  How  curious,  too,  that  circuit  accord- 
ing to  which  the  earth  receives  heat  from  the  beams  of  the  sun 
while  it  is  above  the  horizon,  again  to  give  out  that,  heat,  when 
the  sun  has  set,  to  the  air,  whose  temperature  is  thus  equalized. 
There  is  a  singular  counterpart  process  by  which  the  moisture  is 
evaporated  into  the  air  by  the  heat  during  the  day,  and  again 
given  back  to  the  earth  at  night,  fulfilling  important  functions  in 
both  these  positions. 

Such  circuits  as  these  abound  in  the  works  of  God,  and  indicate 
:i  nice  and  constantly  sustained  adjustment.  There  is  such  a 
rotation  in  that  system,  according  to  which  rude  matter  is  first 
taken  into  vegetable  composition,  then  enters  the  animal  frame 
as  food,  and  then  returns  to  restore  to  the  ground  its  proper  com- 


WITH    THEIR    PROPERTIES    TO    EACH    OTHER.  105 

position.  Another  equally  beautiful  circle  is  described  in  those 
processes  by  which  moisture  is  evaporated  from  the  earth  and 
ocean,  refreshes  the  air  above,  and  thence  descends  upon  the 
ground  to  revive  its  life,  and  to  gush  out  in  streams  ;  the  waters  of 
which  after  serving  many  bountiful  purposes,  again  find  their  way 
back  to  the  ocean.  • 

Now  all  these  balanced  and  balancing  processes  necessarily 
involve  the  most  skilful  adjustments  of  the  properties  of  air, 
earth  and  water,  and  of  organic  and  animal  life  the  one  to  the 
other. 

SECONDLY,  THERE  is  THE  ADJUSTMENT  OF  BODIES  IN  RE- 
SPECT OF  QUANTITY. 

We  have  just  been  noticing  how  needful  it  is  that  the  atmos- 
phere should  keep  its  present  composition.  That  composition  is 
as  follows,  in  tons  : 

Nitrogen,        .        .        .        .        .        .  3,994,592,925,000,000 

Oxygen,          .        .        .        .        .        .  1,233,010,020,000,000 

Carbonic  acid,         .        .        .        . .      .  5,287,805,000,000 

Aqueous  vapor 54,459,750,000,000 


5,287,350,000,000,000 

The  four  elements  of  the  atmosphere — oxygen,  nitrogen,  car- 
bon, and  hydrogen — are  also  the  elements  of  all  vegetable  and 
animal  substances  ;  and  the  two,  the  atmosphere  above  and  or- 
ganized substances  on  the  earth,  being  thus  the  same  in  their 
composition,  are  made  to  sustain  each  other's  functions.  The 
very  statement  is  sufficient  to  show  how  admirable  the  adjustment 
of  the  relative  mass  and  the  total  mass  of  these  separate  elements 
must  be,  in  order  to  keep  in  motion  the  mechanism  of  nature.  An 
atmosphere  of  a  different  composition,  or  liable  to  change  in  re- 
spect of  any  of  its  component  parts,  would  have  been  utterly  un- 
fitted to  support  either  animal  or  vegetable  existence. 

Every  one  knows  how  powerful  an  influence  the  ocean  exer- 
cises upon  the  temperature  of  our  globe.  A  difference  in  the 
quantity  of  its  waters,  or  of  their  distribution,  might  speedily  ex- 
tinguish both  the  flora  and  fauna  of  the  earth.  Sir  C.  Lyell*  has 
shown,  that  in  order  to  the  existence  of  organic  beings,  there  must 
be  the  most  skilful  adjustment  between  their  structure  and  habits 
on  the  one  hand,  and  the  distribution  of  land  and  water  on  the 

*  Principles  of  Geology. 


106  ADJUSTMENT    OF    THE    MATERIAL    SUBSTANCES, 

other.  An  increase  or  diminution  to  a  considerable  extent  of  the 
bulk  of  the  waters  of  the  ocean,  and  consequently  of  their  equal- 
izing influence,  would  so  affect  the  temperature  as  to  render  it 
doubtful  if  any  of  the  existing  species  of  plants  and  animals  could 
survive. 

The  very  mass  of  our  planet  is  in  admirable  adaptation  to  the 
plants  which  grow  upon  its  surface,  and  the  living  beings  that 
people  it.  So  nice  does  this  adjustment  require  to  be,  that  were 
our  earth  much  larger,  or  much  less  than  it  is,  the  greater  num- 
ber of  the  plants  upon  it  would  die ;  and  the  animals  which  did 
not  become  extinct,  would  lead  a  burdensome  existence.  It  seems 
that  plants  pump  up.  by  means  of  some  internal  force,  the  sap 
which  is  needful  for  their  sustenance.  It  requires  no  little  force 
thus  to  raise  the  sap  till  it  reaches  every  branch  and  leaf  of  the 
living  tree.  An  experiment  has  been  tried  witli  a  vine  at  the 
bleeding  season.  A  branch  of  a  growing  plant  was  amputated, 
and  a  glass  tube  was  placed  upon  the  stump,  and  the  sap  was 
pushed  to  .no  less  a  height  than  twenty-one  feet  in  the  tube. 
Now,  had  the  earth  been  heavier  than  it  is,  and  consequently  the 
power  of  gravity  increased,  the  plant  could  not  with  its  present 
organization  draw  up  the  necessary  moisture ;  and,  on  the  other 
hand,  were  the  force  of  gravity  lessened,  the  sap  would  rise  so 
rapidly  as  to  derange  all  the  functions  of  the  plant.  The  author 
from  whom  we  have  taken  this  illustration,  also  supplies  us  with 
another  in  the  flowers  that  hang  their  heads,  in  the  structure  of 
which  it  is  arranged  that  the  pistils  are  longer  than  the  sta- 
mens ;  and  thus  the  dust  needful  for  the  fertility  of  the  flower,  is 
enabled  to  fall  from  the  extremity  of  the  stamens  upon  the  ex- 
tremity of  the  pistil.  "  An  earth  greater  or  smaller,  denser  or 
rarer  than  the  one  on  which  we  live,  would  require  a  change  in 
the  structure  and  strength  of  the  footstalks  of  all  the  little  flow- 
ers that  hang  their  heads  under  our  hedges.  There  is  something 
curious  in  thus  considering  the  whole  mass  from  pole  to  pole,  and 
from  circumference  to  centre,  as  employed  in  keeping  a  snow-drop 
in  the  position  most  suited  to  the  promotion  of  its  vegetable 
health."  * 

We  find,  too,  that  the  size  of  the  earth  bears  an  admirable  rela- 
tion to  the  muscular  strength  of  man  and  animals.  Were  the 
earth  increased  or  lessened  in  its  mass,  the  greatest  inconvenience 
would  follow.  Were  our  planet,  for  instance,  as  large  as  Jupiter, 
*  Whewell's  Astronomy  and  Physic,  p.  48. 


WITH    THEIR    PROPERTIES    TO    EACH    OTHER.  107 

or  Saturn,  or  Neptune,  motion  would  be  oppressive  in  the  extreme 
to  every  living  being.  The  hare  would  crawl  like  the  sloth,  the 
eagle's  flight  would  be  less  extended  than  that  of  our  domestic 
animals  ;  and  man,  as  if  moving  under  a  heavy  burden,  would 
become  exhausted,  and  fall  down  to  the  ground  upon  the  least 
exertion.  Nor  is  it  to  be  forgotten,  that  in  such  a  case  the  air 
would  become  so  dense  that  no  animal  could  breathe  it,  and  press 
so  heavily,  that  it  is  doubtful  if  any  animal  could  sustain  the 
weight.  On  the  other  hand,  were  the  earth  as  small  as  Mercury 
or  the  Moon,  the  animal  would  be  exposed  to  opposite  inconve- 
niences. All  our  motions  would  be  unstable  and  uncertain,  like 
that  of  a  man  in  a  state  of  intoxication  ;  and  every  blow  directed 
against  us  would  prostrate  us  to  the  ground,  while  the  air  would 
become  so  thin  as  to  be  incapable  of  supporting  animal  life.  In 
the  one  state  of  things,  man  would  be  like  a  captive  loaded  with 
chains ;  and  in  the  other,  like  a  man  dizzy  and  staggering 
through  feverishness  and  loss  of  blood. 

THIRDLY,  THERE  is  THE   ADJUSTMENT   OP  BODIES  WITH 

THEIR    PROPERTIES    IN    RESPECT    OF    SPACE. 

These  skilful  collocations  abound  on  the  earth :  as  in  the  posi- 
tion of  the  organs  in  the  animal  and  vegetable  frames,  so  exactly 
adapted  to  their  functions ;  and  in  the  distribution  of  plants  and 
animals  over  the  surface  of  the  globe,  so  nicely  accordant  with 
the  situation  and  climate.  An  eye  placed  in  the  foot,  a  palm  tree, 
or  a  camel,  (instead  of  the  rein-deer.)  in  the  arctic  regions  had 
been  such  an  anomaly  as  the  works  of  God  do  not  exhibit.  But 
the  adaptations  of  this  description  may  be  seen  most  distinctly 
in  the  heavenly  bodies. 

We  can  conceive  the  properties  of  matter  to  be  as  they  are,  and 
yet  the  result  only  a  jumble  of  incongruities,  because  the  bodies 
happened  to  be  too  near  each  other,  or  at  too  great  a  distance.  If 
the  moon,  for  instance,  had  been  much  nearer  the  earth  than  it  is, 
the  tides  of  the  ocean  would  have  run  so  high  that  navigation 
would  have  been  all  but  impossible.  The  planetary  system  would 
never  have  moved,  or  would  long  ago  have  gone  to  wreck,  if-  along 
with  the  present  laws  there  had  not  also  been  a  skilful  collocation 
of  the  various  bodies.  It  is  conceivable  that  all  the  present  bodies 
might  exist  in  the  solar  system,  and  obey  the  law  of  gravitation, 
and  yet  only  confusion  be  the  result.  The  planets  might  have 
been  so  placed  as  to  be  ever  clashing  with  and  disturbing  each 


108  ADJUSTMENT    OF    THE    MATERIAL    SUBSTANCES, 

other  in  their  spheres ;  and  the  law  of  gravitation,  from  its  very 
potency,  would  be  the  means  of  propagating  a  wider  disorder. 
The  conditions  needful  for  the  proper  working  and  stability  of  the 
planetary  system  are — first,  that  almost  all  the  planets  move 
round  the  sun,  in  nearly  the  planes  of  the  sun's  equator ;  secondly, 
that  they  all  revolve  round  the  sun  in  the  same  direction,  which  is 
that  of  the  sun's  rotation  on  his  axis ;  thirdly,  that  they  rotate  on 
their  axis  also  in  that  direction  ;  and  fourthly,  that  the  satellites 
move  round  the  primaries  in  the  same  direction.  In  all  these 
adjustments,  we  are  constrained  to  observe  a  presiding  intelli- 
gence. We  see  that  such  language  as  that  of  Pentecoulant  is  as 
philosophically  incorrect  as  it  is  impious  and  profane,  when  he 
talks  of  "  the  great  law  of  universal  gravitation  as  probably  the 
only  efficient  principle  of  the  creation  of  the  physical  world  as  it 
is  of  its  preservation."*  So  far  from  the  law  of  gravitation  being  a 
principle  of  creation,  it  needs  an  adjustment  made  to  it  as  the  con- 
dition of  its  beneficial  operation. 

FOURTHLY,  THERE  is  THE  ADJUSTMENT  OF  BODIES  TO  EACH 

OTHER  IN  RESPECT  OF  TIME. 

Such  adaptations  are  very  numerous  in  the  animal  economy, 
where  organs  appear  at  the  very  time  that  they  are  needed.  The 
teeth  which  would  be  useless  to  the  infant,  and  worse  than  useless 
to  the  infant's  mother,  appear  as  soon  as  they  can  be  of  advan- 
tage. This  illustration  suggests  another,  supplied  by  that  beauti- 
ful provision  of  nature,  according  to  which  the  mother's  milk  flows 
at  the  very  period  when  the  wants  of  her  new-born  infant  require 
it.  "It  has  been  adduced  as  a  striking  illustration  of  the  Divine 
foresight,  that  the  season  of  the  birth  of  the  young  of  certain  ani- 
mals should  be  adjusted  to  the  season  of  the  year,  and  to  the  pe- 
riod of  the  food  most  conducive  to  its  well-being;  the  preparation 
for  the  birth  of  the  animal,  and  the  preparation  for  the  birth  of  its 
food,  (say  the  larvae  of  insects.)  dating  from  very  different  points 
of  time."f 

Other  departments  of  God's  works  furnish  equally  striking 
illustrations.  There  are,  it  would  appear,  in  the  sunbeam  three 
different  principles — the  chemical,  the  luminiferous,  and  the  'calo- 
rific— and  each  of  these  has  a  special  function  to  discharge  in  re- 
gard to  the  planets  of  the  earth.  The  chemical  principle  has  a 
powerful  influence  in  germinating  the  plant ;  the  luminous  rays 

*  Quoted  in  Nichol's  Thoughts,  p.  85.  f  Harris. 


WITH    THEIR    PROPERTIES    TO    EACH    OTHER.  109 

assist  it  in  secreting  from  the  atmosphere  the  carbon  which  it  re- 
quires in  order  to  its  growth  ;  while  the  heat  rays  are  required  to 
nurture  the  seed  and  form  the  reproductive  elements.  Now,  it  is 
a  remarkable  circumstance  that,  according  to  Hunt,  the  first  of 
these  is  most  powerful  relatively  to  the  others  in  spring,  that  it 
decreases  in  summer,  while  the  second  becomes  more  powerful  ; 
and  that  in  autumn  both  are  lessened,  while  the  third  increases 
in  force — that  is,  each  principle  becomes  potent  at  the  very  time 
when  it  is  most  required. 

Every  one  acquainted  with  the  elements  of  geology  is  aware 
that,  in  the  past  history  of  our  earth,  there  must  have  been  num- 
berless such  adaptations  in  the  planets  and  animals  being  suited 
to  the  particular  era  with  its  temperature  and  moisture.  Whewell 
has  supplied  us  with  an  illustration,  serving  to  connect  heavenly 
with  terrestrial  phenomena,  when  he  demonstrates  that  there  is  a 
connection  between  the  length  of  the  year  and  the  continued  ex- 
istence of  the  plants  of  the  earth.  The  rising  of  the  sap,  the 
formation  of  the  juices,  the  opening  of  the  leaves  and  flowers,  and 
the  ripening  of  the  seed,  and  the  drying  and  maturing  of  it  for 
producing  a  new  plant — these  processes  require  a  certain  period, 
and  no  period  would  suit  but  the  actual  year  of  365  days — that  is, 
the  time  which  the  earth  takes  to  complete  its  revolution  round 
the  sun.  We  are  thus  led  to  discover  a  singular,  and,  we  believe, 
divinely  ordained  adaptation  between  two  things  which  have  no 
physical  connection — the  seasons  of  the  planets  on  the  one  hand, 
and  the  seasons  of  the  earth  in  its  orbit  on  the  other. 

These  four  classes  of  adjustment,  compounded  in  all  varieties 
of  ways,  furnish  those  innumerable  traces  of  design  which  abound 
so  much  in  the  works  of  God,  and  some  few  of  which  have  been 
developed  by  writers  on  natural  theology.  As  the  most  wonder- 
ful example  of  these  various  adjustments  combined,  we  would  be 
inclined  to  mention  the  organization  of  plants  and  animals.  Such 
organization  implies  the  nicest  mutual  adjustment  of  the  constitu- 
ents of  the  body  in  their  proper  quantity  and  proportion,  and  all 
coming  and  departing  at  the  time  required,  and  in  order  to  the 
production  and  development  of  the  form  of  the  body.  "Organi- 
zation," says  Cuvier,*  "  results  from  a  great  number  of  dispositions 
or  arrangements  which  are  conditions  of  life ;"  and  he  adds,  "  the 
general  motion  would  be  arrested  if  any  of  these  conditions  should 

*  Regne  Animal,  Introduction. 


110  ADJUSTMENT    OP    THE    MATERIAL    SUBSTANCES,  . 

be  altered,  or  even  upon  the  arresting  of  any  of  the  partial  motions 
of  which  it  is  composed."  t 

We  are  inclined  to  regard  the  words  organization  and  life  as 
just  general  names  for  a  most  wonderful  adjustment  of  physical 
substances  to  each  other  for  the  production  of  certain  ends.  It 
may  be  all  very  proper  to  speak  of  a  principle  of  life  as  a  brief 
expression  for  a  given  general  phenomenon.  But  let  us  not  de- 
ceive ourselves  with  the  words  which  we  employ.  In  referring 
certain  operations  to  the  principle  of  life,  we  have  not  explained 
them  any  more  than  we  have  explained  fire  by  referring  it  to  a 
combustible  principle.  A  true  explanation  must  exhibit  to  us  the 
properties  and  singular  adjustment  to  each  other  of  the  substances 
of  which  the  living  body  is  composed.  We  believe  that  life  will 
be  found  in  every  case  to  be  the  result  of  a  most  skilful  arrange- 
ment, more  wonderful  in  most  cases  than  the  wonderfully  wise 
collocation  of  the  bodies  in  our  solarsystem.  There  is  as  delicate 
an  adjustment  required,  in  order  to  make  our  muscles  play,  or  the 
organisms  of  plants  fulfil  their  functions,  as  to  make  a  planet  run 
in  its  orbit.  We  rejoice,  then,  in  all  those  experiments  which  are 
made,  in  order  to  discover  the  latent  machinery  of  the  living 
power.  Every  true  discovery  in  this  department  will  tend,  we  are 
convinced,  to  enhance  our  idea  of  the  wonderful  riches  of  the 
Divine  wisdom. 

f  There  are  certain  philosophers  who  are  ever  talking  of  the  laws  of  nature,  as 
if  they  could  accomplish  all  that  we  see  in  the  earth  and  heavens,  without  the  ne- 
cessity of  calling  ip  any  divine  skill  to  arrange  them.  We  have  sometimes  thought 
that  it  might  be  an  appropriate  punishment  to  deal  with  such  persons  as  Jupiter  did 
with  those  who  complained  to  him  of  the  way  in  which  he  regulated  the  weather. 
We  would  give  the  philosophers  referred  to  a  world  of  their  own,  with  all  the  sub- 
stances of  nature,  and  their  properties  labelled  upon  them,  and  arranged  according  to 
human  science,  much  like  the  articles  in  a  museum  or  an  apothecary's  shop.  We 
would  place  the  mineralogist  over  the  metals,  and  the  anatomist  over  the  animals,  and 
the  botanist  over  the  vegetable  substances ;  we  would  give  the  meteorologist  charge 
of  the  atmosphere  and  rain,  and  we  would  furnish  the  astronomer  with  those  nebulae, 
out  of  which  it  is  supposed  that  stars  are  formed  as  webs  are  formed  out  of  fleeces  of 
wool.  Having  called  these  philosophers  together  in  cabinet  council,  we  would  there 
commit  to  them  these  principia  of  worlds.  Taking  care  to  retire  to  a  respectful  dis- 
tance for  safety,  it  might  be  curious  to  listen  to  their  disputes  with  one  another  ;  and 
then,  when  they  had  arranged  their  plans  of  operation,  to  find  the  chemist  blown  up 
by  his  own  gases,  and  the  mineralogist  sinking  in  the  excavations  which  he  had  made, 
and  the  anatomist  groaning  under  disease,  and  the  botanist  pining  for  hunger,  and 
the  weather  regulator  deluged  with  his  own  rain,  and  the  astronomer  driven  ten 
thousand  leagues  into  space  by  the  recalcitration  of  some  refractory  planet.  We  may 
be  sure  that  these  philosophers  would  be  the  first  to  beg  of  Him,  who  is  the  disposer 
as  well  as  the  creator  of  all  things,  to  resume  the  government  of  his  own  world. 


WITH    THEIR    PROPERTIES    TO    EACH    OTHER.  Ill 

It  is  not  for  us  to  say  whether  Matteucci  has  proven  that  all 
organic  tissues  in  living  animals  develop  electricity,  and  as  the 
necessary  consequence  of  the  chemical  processes  of  nutrition ;  or 
whether  there  is  any  semblance  of  a  foundation  for  the  idea,  that 
the  direction  and  formation  of  blood-vessels,  and  the  capillary 
circulation  through  them,  follow  laws  analogous  to,  if  not  identi- 
cal with,  those  of  the  electro-magnetic  force.*  We  allude  to  these 
electro-magnetical  researches,  merely  for  the  purpose  of  showing 
that  modern  investigation  is  seeking  to  go  beyond  the  mere  vague 
reference  to  the  general  principle  of  life,  to  a  cause  in.  the  proper- 
ties and  adjustments  of  the  material  substances  of  which  the 
organic  body  is  composed.  It  must  always  be  understood,  how- 
ever, that  some  of  these  properties  may  be  properties  which  matter 
possesses  only  in  its  organized  state,  or  state  of  peculiar  adjust- 
ment which  we  call  organization.  This  is  the  real  truth,  couched 
in  the  phrase  principle  of  life.t 

There  was  truth  at  the  basis  of  the  ancient  Platonic  idea  of  the 
world  being  an  animal  Nature,  considered  as  a  whole,  resembles 
an  organism  much  more  than  a  human  engine.  Its  powers  re- 
semble the  vital  much  more  than  the  mechanical.  In  mechanical 
operation,  it  is  the  same  matter  performing  the  same  work.  But 
in  nature,  as  in  organic  life,  there  is  a  constant  shifting  of  the 
agents  and  elements :  and  as  in  it,  there  is  a  constant  uniformity 
amidst  constant  change.  The  principle  that  reigns  in  nature  is 
a  principle  of  life,  capable  of  reproducing  itself,  rather  than  of 
dead  mechanical  force.  Nature  recruits  itself  like  the  plant — it 
renews  its  age  like  the  eagle.  Like  all  bodies  possessed  of  life,  it 
has  its  times  and  seasons.  The  present  is  the  seed  of  the  past, 

*  British  Association,  1846. 

f  If  these  views  are  correct,  then  life  may  be  defined  as  a  system  of  arrangements, 
whereby  the  particles  of  matter  acting  according  to  their  properties,  do  by  means  of 
absorption,  assimilation,  and  exhalation,  produce  and  develop  certain  forms,  which 
continue  for  a  time,  and  generate  other  organic  life  of  the  same  species.  This  defi- 
nition may  be  compared  with  those  given  by  Kant,  Cuvier,  and  Whewell.  The  first 
defines  an  organized  product  of  nature,  as  "  that  in  which  all  the  parts  are  mutu- 
ally means  and  ends."  While  this  brings  before  us  a  wonderful  characteristic  of  life, 
yet  it  is  not  a  definition.  Cuvier  gives  us  nothing  but  a  lively  and  loose  description*. 
"Life  is  a  vortex  (tourbillon)  more  or  less  rapid,  more  or  less  complicated;  the  di- 
rection of  which  is  constant,  and  which  always  carries  along  molecules  of  the  same 
kind,  but  into  which  individual  molecules  are  continually  entering,  and  from  which 
they  are  constantly  departing,  so  that  the  form  of  a  living  body  is  more  essential 
to  it  than  its  matter."  Whewell  defines  it  as  "  a  constant  form  of  circulating  matter, 
in  which  the  matter  and  the  form  determine  each  other  by  peculiar  laws." — Phil  of 
Inductive  Sciences,  vol;  ii.  p.  46. 


112  SPECIAL    ADJUSTMENTS    REQUIRED 

and  bears  the  fruit  of  the  future.  If  skilful  adjustments  are  re- 
quired to  give,  even  to  unorganized  matter,  its  operation,  how 
much  nicer  must  those  adjustments  be  which  keep  organic  life  in 
action  ;  and  wonderful  beyond  all  human  comprehension  must  be 
those  multiplied  contrivances  which  sustain  the  continuous  activity 
of  the  whole  of  nature. 

While  nature  as  a  whole  is  sustained  by  arrangements  resem- 
bling the  organic  more  than  the  mechanical  power,  we  are  not, 
therefore,  with  some  fanciful  speculators,  to  leap  to  the  conclusion 
that  it  has  anything  like  animal  life  or  sensation,  or  that  it  is  ca- 
pable of  working  by  its  spontaneous  activity.  Of  all  parts  of  nature 
organisms  are  the  most  dependent  on  arrangements  which  have 
been  made  by  a  higher  power.  The  principle  of  life  is  not  an 
uncreated  self-acting  power,  but  is  the  result  of  constructions  made 
with  unparalleled  skill ;  and  we  feel  in  regard  to  it,  that  there  is 
no  part  of  nature  so  dependent  on  God.  There  is  a  similar  multi- 
plicity, and  to  an  inconceivably  greater  extent,  in  those  arrange- 
ments by  which  the  world  is  sustained  and  made  to  perform  its 
functions ;  and  we  feel  as  if,  besides  the  power  required  to  support 
each  part  of  nature,  there  was  a  still  more  wonderful  power  neces- 
sary to  uphold  it  in  its  agency  as  a  connected  whole. 


SECTION    III.— SPECIAL     ADJUSTMENTS     REQUIRED    IN    ORDER    TO 
PRODUCE    GENERAL    LAWS    OR    RESULTS. 

The  material  world,  we  have  seen,  (Sect.  I.,)  is  constituted  of 
substances  capable  of  affecting  each  other  according  to  certain 
defined  rules,  which  it  is  the  office  of  observation  to  discover,  and 
these  substances  produce  effects  when  two  or  more  are  adjusted  to 
each  other  in  respect  of  the  rule  of  their  operation.  In  his  infinite 
wisdom  and  gooodness  God  has  so  arranged  these  substances  that 
beneficent  results  follow.  (See  Sect.  II.)  Some  of  these  results 
are  of  an  individual  character,  and  may  never  occur  again  in  pre- 
cisely the  same  form.  These  will  fall  to  be  considered  in  the  suc- 
ceeding chapter.  Others  are  of  a  general  character,  and  may 
take  the  form  of  general  laws  in  the  third  sense  of  the  term  as 
above  explained.  It  is  upon  these  that  we  are  now  to  fix  our 
attention.  They  are  the  principal  means  of  producing  order 
throughout  the  visible  universe. 

Proceeding  in  a  deductive  method  we  might  show  that,  as  two 
or  more  substances  when  adjusted  produce  an  individual  effect,  so 


IN    ORDER    TO    PRODUCE    GENERAL    LA.WS    OR    RESULTS.      113 

two  or  more  causes  adjusted  produce  a  general  effect.  Caloric 
coming  into  contact  with  our  nerves  produces  that  sensation  which 
we  call  heat — this  is  an  instance  of  a  particular  effect  following 
an  adjustment.  A  body  radiating  heat,  so  placed  as  constantly  to 
emit  its  heat  upon  our  bodies — the  sun,  for  instance,  in  the  heavens 
— this  is  an  instance  of  an  adjustment  of  causes  producing  a 
general  effect.  But  it  may  be  more  interesting  and  satisfactory, 
perhaps,  to  proceed  in  an  inductive  method,  and  to  observe  first 
the  general  laws  or  results  that  abound  in  every  department  of 
nature,  and  then  show  how  they  all  proceed  from  a  nice  arrange- 
ment of  causes.  The  history  of  science  shows  that  it  has  made 
progress  after  this  method,  first  observing  the  general  laws  of 
phenomena,  and  from  these  rising  to  causes,  and  the  conditions  of 
their  operation.  (See  Note  appended  to  this  Section.) 

From  the  very  earliest  ages  mankind  felt  an  interest  in  observ- 
ing certain  general  laws  or  facts  in  regard  to  the  motions  of  the 
heavenly  bodies.  The  priests  of  India,  the  shepherds  of  Chaldea, 
and  the  husbandmen  of  Egypt,  began  to  notice  the  more  useful 
or  the  more  startling  facts,  and  handed  down  their  observations 
by  tradition,  and  otherwise,  to  succeeding  generations.  These 
observed  facts  grew  in  number  and  value  with  advancing  knowl- 
edge ;  and  every  modern  astronomer  is  amazed  at  the  extent  and 
accuracy  of  the  information  amassed  at  length  by  the  astronomers 
of  the  Greek  and  Alexandrian  schools.  But  while  these  parties 
attained  to  a  most  extensive  knowledge  of  facts,  general  and  par- 
ticular, these  last  being  laws,  they  were  altogether  in  error  as  to 
the  causes  of  the  motions  which  they  observed  and  recorded. 
Kepler  completed  this  class  of  inquiries,  so  far  as  the  planets  were 
concerned,  and  furnished  a  generalization  as  large  and  correct  as 
could  possibly  be  attained  by  mere  observation.  The  comprehen- 
sive mind  of  Newton  rose  above  the  mere  observation  of  such 
general  phenomena  to  the  discovery  of  a  cause,  in  a  property  with 
which  all  matter,  so  far  as  it  comes  under  our  notice,  is  endowed, 
and  according  to  which  it  attracts  other  matter  according  to  the 
reciprocal  of  the  square  of  the  distance.  It  was  now  seen  that 
all  those  other  general  facts,  still  so  useful  in  astronomy,  proceeded 
from  this  general  property  of  matter,  and  from  the  harmonious 
arrangement  of  the  heavenly  bodies,  in  regard  to  their  bulk  and 
situation,  and  the  direction  of  their  motion.  We  thus  perceive 
that  in  the  heavenly  bodies  there  are  certain  general  harmonies 
»md  beneficent  arrangements,  such  as  the  alternation  of  day  and 

8 


114  SPECIAL    ADJUSTMENTS 

night,  and  the  revolution  of  the  seasons,  which  can  be  noticed 
independently  of  all  inquiry  into  causes,  and  that  the  causes,  when 
discovered,  are  found  to  consist  not  in  a  single  property  of  matter, 
but  also,  and  more  especially,  in  these  skilful  dispositions  which 
have  been  made  with  that  property  as  one  of  the  constituents. 

Another  and  a  cognate  example  is  suggested.  The  regular 
motion  of  the  tides  must  have  been  observed  from  the  time  that 
men  dwelt  by  the  sea-coast,  or-  the  first  adventurer  committed 
himself  to  the  waters  of  the  ocean ;  nor  would  it  be  difficult  ta 
determine  their  general  periods  of  ebbing  and  flowing.  But  no 
explanation  was  given  of  the  observed  facts  till  Newton's  discovery, 
when  it  was  found  to  result  from  the  law  of  gravitation  as  con- 
nected with  the  size  and  distance  of  the  moon,  the  magnitude  of 
the  earth,  and  the  fluidity  and  specific  gravity  of  the  waters  of 
the  ocean. 

Take  another  illustration.  The  regular  blowing  of  the  trade 
winds  must  have  been  discovered  at  a  very  early  period  of  the 
history  of  the  world.  The  person  who  was  acquainted  with  the; 
way  in  which  these  winds  usually  blow  was  possessed  of  a  general 
fact.  It  is  only  of  late  years,  however,  that  any  attempt  has  been 
made  to  find  a  cause  of  this  general  fact  lying,  it  is  supposed,  in 
ihe  motion  of  the  earth  round  its  axis,  as  connected  with  the  laws 
of  the  atmosphere,  and  the  particular  distribution  of  land  and 
water.  The  air  heated  at  the  surface  of  the  earth  in  the  tropical 
regions,  rises  to  a  higher  level,  and  flows  towards  the  poles,  where 
it  is  cooled,  and  thence  flows  back  to  the  equator,  being  modified 
in  its  current,  however,  by  the  motion  of  the  earth  on  its  axis,  and 
the  extent  of  the  ocean  in  the  tropics,  and  its  relation  to  the  land, 
The  person  who  observes  the  general  current  of  the  air  is  in  pos- 
session of  a  generalized  fact  which  it  is  most  useful  to  know;  the 
inquiry  into  the  causes  of  that  fact  conducts  us  into  another  field, 
in  which  we  investigate  the  properties  of  air,  earth,  and  water,  in 
their  reference  to  each  other. 

A  curious  analogy  may  be  discovered  between  these  currents 
of  the  atmosphere  and  the  migrations  of  the  human  species,  and 
in  both  cases  with  the  view  of  promoting  similar  ends  in  the 
Divine  purposes,  the  equalizing  of  inconvenient  extremes.  In  the 
•early  ages  of  the  world,  the  migrations  of  mankind  were  com- 
monly from  the  warm  and  fertile  regions  of  Asia  towards  the 
colder  portions  of  the  earth.  In  those  ages  which  commence  the 
modern  history  of  Europe,  the  tide  is  flowing  in  an  opposite  direcr 


IN    ORDER    TO    PRODUCE    GENERAL    LAWS    OR    RESULTS.      115 

lion,  and  swarms  of  human  beings  are  pouring  in  from  the  colder 
?ind  more  barren  regions  into  Spain.  France,  Italy,  and  Turkey. 
•Such  are  the  general  facts  noticed  by  every  historian,  and  the 
cause  is  to  be  found  in  the  nature  of  man,  and  the  relative  num- 
bers and  position  of  the  human  race  at  the  two  epochs.  In  the 
fjarly  ages,  as  food  became  scarce  in  the  warmer  regions  of  the 
earth,  it  was  found  easier  to  migrate  to  colder  countries  than  to 
improve  agriculture  to  such  an  extent  as  to  supply  the  fast  in- 
creasing population  with  food,  and  hence  favored,  it  may  be,  by 
unfortunate  dissensions,  and  by  the  spirit  of  enterprise  and  ambi- 
tion, the  current  towards  the  north.  The  direction  of  the  breezes 
-changes  when  the  northern  regions  become  fully  peopled,  and  the 
•corrupting  luxuries  of  the  softer  territories  of  the  south  produce  a 
heated  and  hazy  atmosphere,  inviting  the  more  bracing  energies 
of  the  north  to  rush  in.  The  tropics  are  not  more  effectually 
benefited  by  the  colder  wind  from  the  poles,  than  modern  Europe 
has  been  by  the  inroads  of  the  hardier  and  bolder  tribes  from  the 
north,  in  the  various  ages  from  the  fifth  to  the  tenth  centuries. 
Similar  causes,  modified  by  circumstances  of  a  religious  and  po- 
litical character,  have  produced  that  powerful  trade  wind  current, 
which  has  given  its  civilized  population  to  America.  Increasing 
facilities  for  travelling  have  of  late  been  promoting  migration 
when  some  of  the  other  influences  were  not  so  operative.  The 
very  same  circumstances,  as  kingdoms  become  fixed  and  there  is 
4ess  room  for  emigration,  will  force  an  improved  agriculture  in  the 
older  countries.  We  mention  these  things  in  order  to  show  that 
there  are  general  facts  which  may  be  observed  altogether  inde- 
pendently of  their  causes  ;  and  that  these  general  results,  when 
we  inquire  into  them,  are  found  to  flow  from  special  arrangements 
?nade  by  the  Disposer  of  all  things,  and  in  accordance  with  the 
particular  properties  with  which  his  creatures  have  been  endowed. 

Other  illustrations  will  present  themselves.  The  gulf-stream 
was  observed  long  before  any  particular  cause  could  be  assigned. 
'The  periodical  rising  of  the  waters  of  the  Nile  was  known  and 
correctly  registered,  when  there  were  many  disputes  as  to  the  cir- 
cumstances which  produced  it. 

Here  it  may  be  of  some  importance  to  remark,  that  natural 
history  has  very  much,  if  not  altogether,  to  do  with  the  observa- 
tion of  the  general  facts  or  results,  proceeding  from  the  skilful 
adjustments  made  by  God,  rather  than  with  causes.  In  in- 
vestigating the  vegetable  and  animal  kingdoms,  the  inquirer  doee 


116  SPECIAL    ADJUSTMENTS    REQUIRED 

not  concern  himself  so  much  with  causes  as  with  phenomena^ 
which  he  can  generalize  by  means  of  their  points  of  resemblance. 
He  first  arranges  animals  and  plants  into  speeies  and  genera  by 
the  parts  which  they  have  in  common  ;  and  as  science  advances, 
he  observes  other  resemblances  less  obvious  till  he  rises  to  the 
highest  possible  generalizations.  At  the  same  time,  it  should  be 
remembered  that  these  general  facts — the  forms  and  develop- 
ments of  organic  bodies,  and  their  general  resemblances  whereby 
they  are  classified — all  originate  in  particular  properties  of  mat- 
ter, organized  and  unorganized,  and  the  skilful  arrangements 
that  have  been  made  by  the  Creator.  While  the  mere  student  of 
natural  history  does  not  feel  that  it  is  his  province  to  inquire  into 
such  causes,  others  will  not  be  prevented  from  pursuing  the  in- 
vestigation this  length.  The  chemical,  mechanical,  and  organic 
properties  of  living  objects,  and  the  adjustments  of  their  parts  and 
processes,  will  all  require  to  be  investigated  in  order  to  determine 
the  secret  machinery  by  which  life  is  sustained ;  and  the  dis- 
closures, we  are  persuaded,  if  not  so  grand,  will  in  many  respects 
be  more  wonderful,  than  those  which  have  been  revealed  iu  the 
study  of  the  planetary  system. 

It  appears,  then,  that  in  investigating  the  works  of  nature,  our 
object  may  be  to  refer  a  given  phenomenon  to  a  general  rule,  or 
to  refer  it  to  a  cause.  These  inquiries  differ  from  each  other, 
though  they  are  often  confounded.  In  the  one,  the  inquirer  is 
seeking  after  a  class  of  facts,  and  in  the  other,  after  what  pro- 
duces these  facts.  The  latter,  if  prosecuted  sufficiently  far,  will 
lead  to  the  discovery  of  a  great  first  cause,  and  the  other  is  ever 
furnishing  new  illustrations  of  the  wisdom  residing  in  that  cause. 

But  this  is  not  the  precise  end  which  we  have  been  seeking  to 
reach  by  means  of  this  induction  ;  we  think  that  we  have  satis- 
factorily established  two  very  important  truths. 

The  first  is,  that  the  works  of  God  are  full  of  general  facts  or 
laws — most  of  them  obvious  to  all  who  take  the  pains  to  inquire 
into  them,  and  capable  of  being  discovered  independently  of  any 
examination  of  their  causes. 

The  second  is,  that  these  general  laics  are  the  result  of  a  num- 
ber of  arrangements.  The  very  operation  of  a  cause,  we  have 
seen,  implies  the  presence  of  two  or  more  bodies  in  a  certain  re- 
lation lo  each  other;  but  a  general  fact  implies  more,  it  implies 
an  adjustment  of  the  causes  with  the  view  of  yielding  such  gene- 
ral results. 


IN    ORDER    TO    PRODUCE    GENERAL    LAWS    OR    RESULTS.      H7 

These  truths  are  so  important  that  they  demand  some  farther 
illustration.  Conceive  a  manner  observing,  as  his  vessel  sails 
along  a  difficult  coast,  the  lighthouses  which  line  it.  One  he 
finds  has  a  steady  white  light,  another  is  intermittent,  a  third 
flashes  once  every  five  or  ten  minutes,  and  a  fourth  is  revolving, 
and  shows  alternately  a  red  and  white  light.  For  his  special 
purposes,  the  sailor  is  satisfied  when  he  has  observed  these  appear- 
ances of  the  lighthouses.  He  sees,  for  instance,  a  lighthouse 
which  shows  alternately  a  red  and  white  light  every  two  minutes, 
and  he  ascertains  by  inspection  or  a  nautical  almanac,  that  it  is 
planted  on  a  certain  rock.  On  all  future  occasions  the  very  sight 
of  that  same  alternating  light  is  sufficient  to  indicate  at  what  part 
of  the  coast  he  is. 

But  there  is  a  person  of  an  inquiring  turn  of  mind,  or  a  me- 
chanic sailing  in  the  same  vessel,  and  he  will  not  be  satisfied  with 
these  mere  observations.  Determined  to  ascertain  the  cause  of 
the  evident  phenomena,  he  would  inquire  into  the  shape  and 
structure  of  the  lighthouse,  and  the  metal  and  glass,  and  the 
light  and  machinery  employed  in  it.  This  man  has  arrived  at 
farther  knowledge  than  the  manner  possesses,  and  knowledge 
that  may  be  useful  for  other  purposes. 

Now,  we  have  here  a  picture  of  the  method  which  the  mind 
commonly  pursues  in  its  inquiries  into  the  works  of  God.  It  first 
observes  and  generalizes  its  observations,  as  the  mariner  watches 
the  lights  beaming  in  the  darkness,  and  groups  them  into  the 
various  lighthouses.  But  the  inquiring  spirit  will  not  rest  satis- 
fied with  this.  Even  for  practical  purposes,  it  finds  it  useful  not 
only  to  know  the  general  fact,  but  also  the  cause  from  which  it 
has  sprung.  And  in  all  speculative  inquiries  as  to  the  production 
of  any  event,  it  knows  that  a  general  rule,  while  it  may  be  emi- 
nently useful,  is  yet  no  explanation,  and  it  seeks  for  those  ante- 
cedent circumstances  which  have  produced  the  result,  and  which 
will  produce  it  again. 

But  our  object  in  bringing  this  distinction  under  notice  is  to 
show  that  nature  abounds  in  orderly  facts  and  results,  which 
mankind  observe,  and  are  enabled  in  consequence  to  suit  them- 
selves to  the  world  in  which  they  dwell,  just  as  the  mariner,  by 
observing  the  regular  flashing  of  the  alternate  lights,  is  enabled 
to  gather  at  what  part  of  the  coast  he  is.  Our  farther,  and  indeed 
especial  object  is  to  show  that  these  orderly  results  all  imply  a, 
multiplicity  of  ingenious  arrangements,  just  as  in  the  lighthouse, 


118  SPECIAL    ADJUSTMENTS    REQUIRED,    ETC. 

it  is  implied,  that  the  light  be  adjusted  to  the  silver  that  reflect* 
it,  or  the  glass  that  concentrates  it,  and  so  adjusted  as  to  produce- 
these  regular  or  intermittent  flashes.  There  is  a  double  adjust- 
ment in  the  system  of  lighthouses,  the  adjustment  whereby  the 
tight  is  afforded,  and  the  adjustment  whereby  there  is  a  result 
according  to  rule  presented  to  the  mariner.  Now  we  maintain 
shat  nature  is  full  of  such  adjustments.  There  is  not  only  the 
adjustment  of  properties  so  as  to  produce  causes,  but  the  adjust- 
ment of  causes  acting  independently  of  each  other  so  as  to  pro- 
duce uniform  effects. 

We  can  conceive  of  a  world  in  which  there  might  be  the  opera- 
tion of  causation,  and  yet  few  or  no  general  results.  A  cause  in 
the  same  circumstances  produces  the  same  effects ;  but  in  the  sup- 
posed world  the  same  circumstances  might  not  recur,  or  not  recur 
after  any  general  rule,  and  thus  there  would  be  nothing  but  con- 
fusion, even  with  the  series  of  uniform  sequences.  It  requires 
adaptation  upon  adaptation,  it  requires  the  adaptation  of  sub- 
stance to  substance,  and  of  cause  to  cause,  to  produce  those 
regular  results  in  which  nature  abounds,  and  which,  as  we  shall 
proceed  to  show  in  the  next  section,  are  so  suited  to  the  constitu- 
tion of  man. 

And  let  us  observe  how  absurd  the  conclusions  of  those,  who 
congratulate  themselves  in  the  thought,  that  they  have  explained, 
any  given  phenomenon  when  they  have  referred  it  to  a  law.  We 
had  occasion  to  remark  formerly,  that,  in  ascribing  an  event  to  & 
general  law,  so  far  from  explaining  its  production,  there  is  only 
brought  under  our  notice  other  objects  so  far  resembling  it,  and 
equally  with  it  demanding  explanation.  But  we  can  now  go  a 
step  farther,  and  notice  how  in  this  general  law  there  must  be  ID 
number  of  adjustments  implied,  additional  to  those  involved  in  the 
production  of  a  single  effect.  When  phenomena,  falling  out  ac- 
cording to  a  law,  are  brought  before  us,  we  have  now  to  determine 
not  only  the  adjustments  which  produce  the  separate  events,  but 
also  the  adjustments  which  produce  them  according  to  a  law.  In 
referring  a  phenomenon  to  a  law.  we  are  multiplying  the  wonders 
of  nature,  in  so  far  as  we  are  bringing  into  view  not  only  other 
phenomena  which  require  to  be  accounted  for,  but  an  order  among 
them  requiring  also  to  be  explained. 

There  are  in  nature  no  other  inherent  powers  but  those  which 
reside  in  the  separate  substances,  and  which  we  call  its  properties.. 
It  appears  to  us  that  the  creation  of  the  substances,  the  imparting 


LAWS    AND    CAUSES    OF    PHENOMENA.  119 

to  them  of  their  properties,  and  their  arrangements  in  reference  to 
one  another,  all  proceed  from  the  same  Divine  hand.  But  though 
it  were  admitted,  for  the  sake  of  argument,  that  these  properties  iri 
themselves  furnished  no  indication  of  a  Creator,  still  we  could 
have  abundant  evidence  of  the  existence  of  a  designing  mind  in 
(he  adjustment  of  these  properties  so  as  to  admit  of  their  beneficial 
operation,  and  in  the  ingenious  and  complex  adjustments  requisite 
in  order  to  events  falling  out  in  that  orderly  manner  which  we  call 
general  laws.  So  far  from  general  laws  being  able,  as  super- 
ficial thinkers  imagine,  to  produce  the  beautiful  adaptations 
which  are  so  numerous  in  nature,  they  are  themselves  the  re- 
sults of  nicely  balanced  and  skilful  adjustments. 

We  see.  now,  the  error  of  all  those  who,  like  Humboldt  and 
Augustus  Comte,  never  get  beyond  laws  and  developments.  The 
latter  boasts  that  he  has  established  a  positive  philosophy,  free  from 
all  theory,  and  seems  to  think  that  science  can  never  rise  beyond 
general  law.  But  positive  philosophy  tells  us  that  there  is  never 
a  phenomenon  without  a  cause,  never  a  general  phenomenon,  or 
class  of  phenomena  without  a  general  cause ;  and  it  is  from  the 
adjusted  relations  of  these  general  causes,  that  we  rise  up  by 
means  of  the  clearest  principles  of  a  positive  philosophy,  to  the 
belief  in  an  Intelligence  presiding  over  the  universe. 

ILLUSTRATIVE  NOTE  (B).— LAWS  OF  PHENOMENA,  CAUSES  OF  PHENOMENA, 
CONDITIONS  OF  THE  OPERATION  OF  CAUSES. 

The  views  which  we  have  partially  exhibited  in  the  text  are 
fitted,  if  carried  out,  to  furnish,  in  our  apprehension,  some  assist- 
ance in  introducing  order  into  a  topic  which  is  still  somewhat  con- 
fused— the  logic  of  physical  investigation.  We  must  not  be 
tempted  to  enter  far  into  a  subject  which  we  feel  ourselves  inca- 
pacitated to  grapple  with  in  all  its  extent.  The  few  observations 
which  we  have  to  offer  may  be  best  delivered  in  the  shape  of  a 
brief  review  of  the  two  learned  and  philosophical  works  of  Whewell 
on  the  History  and  Philosophy  of  the  Inductive  Sciences. 

This  author,  throughout  these  works,  has  made  a  frequent  and 
profitable  use  of  the  distinction  between  the  inquiry  into  the  laws 
of  phenomena  and  the  causes  of  phenomena.  "  Inductive  truths 
are  of  two  kinds — laws  of  phenomena,  and  theories  of  causes.  If. 
is  necessary  to  begin  in  every  science  with  the  laws  of  phenomena, 
but  it  is  impossible  that  we  should  be  satisfied  to  stop  short  of  a 
theory  of  causes.  In  physical  astronomy,  physical  optics,  geology, 


120  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

and  other  sciences,  we  have  instances  showing  that  we  can  make 
a  great  advance  in  inquiries  after  the  true  theories  of  causes."  * 

In  illustrating  this  remark,  he  states,  that  in  "  their  first  at- 
tempts men  discovered  an  order  which  the  phenomena  follow, 
rules  whicli  they  obey ;  but  they  did  not  come  in  sight  of  the 
powers  by  which  these  rules  are  determined — the  causes  of  which 
this  order  is  the  effect.  Thus,  for  example,  they  found  that  many 
of  the  celestial  motions  took  place,  as  if  the  sun  and  stars  were 
carried  round  by  the  revolution  t)f  certain  celestial  spheres,  but 
that  causes  kept  these  spheres  in  constant  motion  which  they  were 
not  able  to  explain.  In  like  manner,  in  modern  times,  Kepler  dis- 
covered that  the  planets  describe  ellipses  before  Newton  explained 
why  they  select  this  particular  course,  and  describe  it  in  a  particu- 
lar manner.  The  laws  of  reflection,  refraction,  dispersion,  and 
other  properties  of  light,  have  long  been  known  ;  the  causes  of 
these  laws  are  at  present  under  discussion."  "Hence  the  larger 
part  of  our  knowledge  of  nature,  at  least  of  the  certain  portion  of 
it,  consists  of  the  knowledge  of  the  laws  of  phenomena.  In 
astronomy,  indeed,  besides  knowing  the  rules  which  guide  the  ap- 
pearances, and  resolving  them  into  the  real  motions  from  which 
they  arise,  we  can  refer  these  motions  to  the  forces  which  produce 
them.  In  optics  we  have  become  acquainted  with  a  vast  number 
of  laws,  by  which  varied  and  beautiful  phenomena  are  governed ; 
and  perhaps  we  may  assume,  since  the  evidence  of  the  undulatory 
theory  has  been  so  fully  developed,  that  we  know  also  the  causes 
of  the  phenomena.  But  in  a  large  class  of  sciences,  while  we 
have  learned  many  laws  of  phenomena,  the  causes  by  which  these 
are  produced  are  still  unknown  or  disputed.  Are  we  to  ascribe  to 
the  operation  of  a  fluid  or  fluids ;  and  if  so,  in  what  manner,  the 
facts  of  heat,  magnetism,  electricity,  galvanism? — what  are  the 
forces  by  which  the  elements  of  chemical  compounds  are  held 
together? — what  are  the  forces  of  a  higher  order,  as  we  cannot 
help  believing  by  which  the  course  of  vital  action  in  organized 
bodies  is  kept  up?  In  these  and  other  cases,  we  have  extensive 
departments  of  science,  but  we  are  as  yet  unable  to  trace  the 
effects  to  their  causes,  and  our  science,  so  far  as  it  is  positive  and 
certain,  consists  entirely  of  the  laws  of  phenomena."  t 

In  his  work  on  the  History  of  the  Inductive  Sciences,  Whewell 
shows  how  all  the  sciences  have  been  following  the  order  now 
pointed  out.  First,  in  every  science  there  is  a  preparatory  period 

*  Philosophy  of  Inductive  Sciences,  vol.  i.,  Apb.  24.  f  Vol.  ii.  p.  260. 


LAWS    AND    CAUSES    OF    PHENOMENA.  121 

or  the  prelude  of  discovery,  in  which  inquirers  are  busily  employed 
in  discovering  the  laws  of  phenomena.  Then,  secondly,  there  is 
the  period  of  the  discovery  itself.  Thirdly,  there  is  the  period  of 
deduction  in  which  the  law  or  cause  is  verified,  and  carried  out  to 
the  explanation  of  existing  phenomena.  Among  the  earliest  dis- 
coveries in  astronomy  may  be  reckoned  the  formation  of  the  notion 
of  the  year,  and  the  grouping  of  the  heavens  into  constellations. 
It  was  ascertained  by  the  Chaldees  that,  after  a  certain  period  of 
years,  similar  sets  of  ecjipses  return.  The  discovery  of  such  laws 
formed  the  prelude  to  the  period  of  Hipparchus.  Hipparchus  re- 
solved these  phenomena  into  higher  laws,  of  which  epicycles  and 
eccentrics  were  the  best  expression.  Coming  down  to  modern 
times,  we  find,  first,  certain  useful  observations  as  a  prelude,  then 
the  discovery  of  the  laws  of  Kepler,  and  a  sequel  to  this  discovery 
in  the  application  of  these  laws  to  the  planets  and  moon.  The 
laws  of  Kepler,  and  the  laws  of  motion  as  established  by  Galileo, 
were  the  prelude  to  the  discovery  of  Newton,  which  discovery  has 
a  train  of  verification  reaching  down  to  the  present  day.  Whewell 
endeavors  to  trace  the  same  order  in  what  he  calls  the  secondary 
mechanical  sciences.  Thus  in  optics  we  have  a  period  of  prelude, 
during  which  the  laws  of  phenomena  were  carefully  observed,  and 
as  an  example,  he  gives  Sir  D.  Brewster's  rule  for  the  polarizing 
angle  of  different  bodies,  that  rule  being  that  the  index  of  refrac- 
tion is  the  tangent  of  the  angle  of  polarization.  Such  laws  formed 
the  preparation  to  the  discovery  of  the  undulatory  theory,  (sup- 
posed by  Whewell  to  be  the  true  one,)  as  established  by  Young 
and  Fresnel,  and  now  being  corrected  and  verified.  In  the  science 
of  heat,  inquirers  have  in  time  past  been  busily  employed  in  col- 
lecting laws  of  phenomena  in  regard  to  conduction,  radiation, 
polarization,  which  it  is  hoped  may  speedily  issue  in  the  true  the- 
ory. In  chemistry,  and  the  sciences  which  treat  of  electricity, 
magnetism,  and  galvanism,  the  object  sought  is  to  discover  laws 
of  phenomena.  As  an  example,  we  have  the  law  of  definite  pro- 
portions as  developed  by  Dalton,  and  which  may  be  regarded  as 
consisting  of  three  parts,  that  elements  combine  in  definite  pro- 
portions, that  these  determining  proportions  operate  reciprocally, 
and  that  when  between  the  same  elements  several  combining 
proportions  occur,  they  are  related  as  multiples.  The  singular 
laws  detected  by  Faraday  in  electricity  and  magnetism  seem  to 
have  brought  us  to  the  very  verge  of  some  brilliant  discovery  in 
these  departments  of  nature. 


122 


ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 


Such  is  the  extensive  induction  of  Whewell  in  reference  to  the 
development  of  scientific  inquiry.  It  furnishes,  we  conceive,  a 
striking  illustration  and  confirmation  of  the  views  advanced  in 
the  text.  And,  if  we  do  not  mistake,  the  views  now  set  forth  in 
these  sections  serve  to  give  an  explanation  of  the  progression, 
which  the  able  historian  of  philosophy  has  so  well  described. 

We  are  now  in  circumstances  to  apply  the  distinction  of  which 
Whewell  makes  such  profitable  use  to  his  own  researches,  and 
to  furnish,  if  we  mistake  not,  the  causes,  of  those  laws  of  phe- 
nomena which  he  has  so  skilfully  traced  in  the  history  of  the  in- 
ductive sciences. 

Let  us  take  along  with  us  these  three  general  truths,  First,  that 
God  has  so  arranged  the  universe  that  general  results  or  facts 
everywhere  fall  under  our  notice ;  Secondly,  that  these  general 
results  proceed  from  causes;  and  Thirdly,  that  these  causes  require 
assorted  adjustments  as  the  condition  of  their  operation.  Take 
these  three  general  facts,  and  apply  them  to  the  subject  before  us, 
and  they  will  at  once  explain  the  course  which  inductive  science 
has  run. 

(1.)  Nature,  we  have  said,  is  full  of  general  facts  or  phenom- 
ena. Many  of  these  general  facts  or  results  are  of  a  very  obvi- 
ous nature,  and  are  intended  to  be  noticed  by  all  who  take  the 
trouble  of  exercising  their  minds  and  senses.  Thus  the  alterna- 
tion of  day  and  night  and  of  the  seasons,  and  the  periods  of  the 
moon,  would  be  early  discovered  by  all.  We  can  conceive  that 
one  of  the  first  efforts  of  true  science  would  consist  in  giving  pre- 
cision to  these  observations;  in  determining,  for  instance,  the  true 
length  of  the  year  and  the  lunar  month.  The  more  striking  phe- 
nomena of  the  heavens,  such  as  eclipses,  would  then  come  to  be 
observed,  till  by  degrees,  and  as  society  advanced,  certain  persons 
would  be  induced  .to  pursue  science  for  its  own  sake,  and  inde- 
pendently altogether  of  the  immediate  practical  good  derived  from 
it,  or  fame  accruing  to  those  who  were  able  to  predict  some  of  the 
more  startling  appearances  of  the  heavenly  bodies.  General  ob- 
servations in  regard  to  the  sun  and  moon's  apparent  motion  in  the 
sidereal  heavens  would  come  to  be  multiplied,  and  handed  down 
as  a.  precious  legacy  to  future  generations.  The  fertility  of  mind, 
and  the  indefatigable  perseverance  of  Kepler,  conducted  at  last  to 
the  discovery  of  the  laws  which  bear  his  name,  and  these,  with  the 
mechanical  discoveries  of  Galileo,  enabled  Newton  to  rise  to  the 
discovery  of  the  law  of  gravitation.  Now,  all  along  this  length- 


LAWS    AND    CAUSES    OF    PHENOMENA.  123 

ened  line,  we  have  merely  the  discovery  of  interesting  and  instruc- 
tive general  results,  till  Newton  arrives  at  a  cause  in  a  property 
inherent,  as  far  as  we  can  see,  in  all  masses  of  matter.  Though 
it  should  be  discovered  that  this  property  is  the  result  of  other 
properties  of  matter,  (as  from  the  mutual  repulsion  of  all  particles 
of  matter  combined  with  the  somewhat  greater  mutual  attraction 
of  matter  and  an  all-pervading  electric  fluid,)  still  as  gravitation 
is  a  property  of  all  masses  of  matter,  we  are  not  the  less  to  re- 
gard Newton  as  having  ascended  to  the  discovery  of  a  cause. 

(2.)  It  appears,  then,  that  God  has  so  constituted  this  world, 
that  mankind  can  observe  many  interesting  laws  of  great  specu- 
lative and  practical  value,  though  they  have  no  conception  what- 
ever of  their  causes.  But  still  these  general  phenomena — being 
merely  particular  phenomena,  resembling  each  other  in  certain 
respects — do  all  proceed  from  causes.  We  now  know,  for  ex- 
ample, that  all  those  general  laws  of  the  movements  of  the  heav- 
enly bodies  which  were  observed  with  such  interest  by  the  ancient 
astronomers,  and  which  are  still  watched  by  the  husbandman  and 
shepherd,  proceed  from  the  property  of  gravitation,  as  connected 
with  the  collocation  of  the  bodies  which  attract  each  other. 
These  laws  in  themselves  were  fitted  to  excite  an  intense  interest 
in  the  human  mind,  and  the  observation  of  them  served  most  im- 
portant practical  purposes;  and  they  were  so  obvious,  at  least 
some  of  them,  that  the  mind  could  arrive  at  a  knowledge  of  them 
without  having  so  much  as  a  glimpse  of  their  cause.  But  still 
there  was  a"h  anxiety  all  along  to  discover  the  cause  of  which  they 
were  the  effects  ;  and  the  discovery  of  Newton  is  hailed  as  the 
greatest  contribution  ever  made  to  astronomy.  And  let  it  be  ob 
served,  that  it  was  the  discovery  of  these  laws  of  phenomena  that 
enabled  Newton  to  find  out  the  cause  of  the  phenomena.  This 
is  easily  explained.  The  cause  is  so  adjusted  as  to  produce  these 
general  phenomena,  which  become  in  consequence  the  most  ex- 
pressive indication  of  the  nature  of  that  cause. 

While  the  learned  author,  whose  works  we  are  reviewing,  has 
seen  very  clearly  the  distinction  between  the  laws  of  phenomena 
and  the  causes  of  phenomena,  yet  he  has  not  observed,  or  at  least 
he  has  not  pointed  out,  the  connection  which  subsists  between 
them.  These  laws  of  phenomena  proceed  from  causes,  and 
causes  assorted  so  as  to  produce  these  laws,  and  so  they  are  the 
most  direct  and  effectual  means  of  enabling  us  to  trace  these 
causes.  It  was  the  steady  contemplation  of  those  laws  of  phe- 


124  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

nomena  which  Kepler  discovered,  that  furnished  Newton  with  the 
data  on  which  he  proceeded,  in  forming  a  correct  theory  of  the 
causes  of  the  visible  motions  of  the  planetary  bodies.  We  thus 
perceive,  that  as  the  discovery  of  the  laws  of  phenomena  gen- 
erally precedes  the  discovery  of  causes,  so  the  former  is  the  most 
certain  means  of  reaching  the  latter.  We  can  account  in  this 
manner  for  the  nature  of  that  progress,  which  Whewell  has  traced 
so  beautifully  in  the  development  of  science. 

(3.)  In  doing  so,  however,  we  must  take  into  account  the  third 
general  truth  which  we  have  enunciated — that  causes  require 
adjustments  as  the  condition  of  their  operation.  There  is 
something  more  in  the  true  cause  of  the  heavenly  motions  than 
the  mere  property  of  gravitation  ;  there  are  adjusted  relations  of 
space  and  time.  These  had  to  be  taken  into  account  by  Newton 
before  he  could  establish  his  doctrine  of  universal  gravitation. 
The  laws  of  Kepler  related  to  these  adjustments  of  time  and 
space — they  related  to  the  orbit  of  the  planets,  and  the  times  of 
the  planets'  revolutions ;  and  were  thus  the  means  of  enabling 
the  comprehensive  mind  of  Newton  to  grasp  the  whole  complex 
cause.  It  is  a  curious  circumstance,  and  indicative  of  the  neces- 
sity of  taking  such  relations  into  account,  that  an  erroneous  cal- 
culation of  the  distance  of  the  moon  from  the  earth  led  Newton 
for  a  time  to  lay  aside  his  theory  as  altogether  worthless.  The 
discovery  of  Newton  was  made,  through  a  steady  apprehension 
of  the  distances  of  the  heavenly  bodies,  the  times  of  their  revolu- 
tions and  the  laws  of  force  and  motion,  being  the  conditions 
necessary  for  the  operation  of  the  cause. 

By  not  taking  into  view  the  general  truth  now  referred  to, 
Whewell,  as  it  appears  to  us.  has  fallen  into  a  grievous  mistake. 
He  speaks  of  the  philosopher's  ideas  of  space  and  time  as  giving 
coherency  to  the  phenomena  which  he  observes,  and  everywhere 
talks  of  these  ideas  superinducing  upon  nature  something  which 
does  not  actually  exist.  Now,  the  correct  expression  seems  to  us 
rather  to  be,  that  those  who  possess  adequate  and  steady  concep- 
tions of  space  and  time  are  enabled  to  discover  the  relations  of 
space  and  time,  which  are  to  be  found  in  the  works  of  nature,  and 
which  are  so  necessary  to  their  operation.  The  mind,  as  Whe- 
well shows,  must  be  active  in  making  scientific  discoveries,  or  even 
in  apprehending  scientific  facts ;  but  its  activity  consists,  not  in 
adding  to  phenomena  relations  which  do  not  exist  in  nature,  but 
in  apprehending,  by  means  of  active  intellectual  faculties,  the 


CONDITIONS    OF    THE    OPERATION    OP    CAUSES. 

relations  which  are  needful  in  order  to  the  beneficial  action  of  the 
works  of  God. 

It  is  because  the  relations  of  space  and  time  are  involved  as 
conditions  in  the  operation  of  universal  gravitation,  that  the  sci- 
ence, which  has  to  do  with  space  and  time,  (we  mean  the  mathe- 
matics,) furnishes  such  aid  in  astronomy.  Hence,  too,  the  ne- 
cessity on  the  part  of  all  who  would  successfully  prosecute 
astronomy  of  clear  ideas  of  space  and  time.  This  does  not  arise, 
as  Whewell  seems  to  think,  from  the  circumstance  of  these  ideas 
being  needful  to  superinduce  upon  the  facts  which  astronomy  pre- 
sents, something  which  has  no  reality,  but  from  the  more  obvious 
circumstance  that  these  ideas  are  needful  in  order  to  enable  us  to. 
understand  the  relations  that  actually  exist. 

On  the  supposition  that  the  undulatory  theory  of  light  is  the 
correct  one,  we  may  observe  these  same  three  general  truths,  and 
by  them  explain  the  progress  which  has  been  made  in  this  de- 
partment of  science.  These  undulations  being  regular  in  a  homo- 
geneous ether,  must  produce  certain  general  results  which  were 
noticed  in  the  first  stages  of  inquiry ;  and  these  general  phenom- 
ena at  length  conducted  Young  and  Fresnell  to  the  establishment 
(it  is  supposed)  of  the  undulatory  theory.  They  did  so,  because 
these  general  phenomena  resulted  from  the  operation  of  the  cause 
to  the  discovery  of  which  they  thus  led.  And  let  it  be  observed, 
that  this  cause  implies  the  adjustment  of  the  undulations  and 
the  ethereal  fluid  in  which  they  take  place.  Some  move  faster 
than  others ;  and  the  more  rapid  in  overtaking  the  others,  pro- 
duce, it  is  supposed,  what  are  called  interferences.  Then  these 
vibrations,  in  order  to  produce  the  actual  results,  must  be  trans- 
verse vibrations.  All  these  are  skilful  adjustments,  without  which 
the  end  could  not  be  accomplished — the  production  of  vision. 
Hence  the  necessity  of  clear  and  comprehensive  ideas  of  force 
and  motion  and  place  on  the  part  of  all  who  would  prosecute 
this  science ;  and  this  not  as  Whewell  would  say,  because  every 
discovery  consists  in  the  application  of  a  correlative  idea  to  exist- 
ing facts,  but  because  the  facts  have  a  peculiar  relation  in  respect 
of.  space  and  time  and  force,  which  it  is  the  business  of  the  ob- 
server to  display,  and  of  the  philosopher  to  resolve  into  its  cause. 

In  the  sciences  not  mechanical,  such  as  chemistry,  the  laws  of 
phenomena  must  all  proceed  from  a  similar  adjustment  of  sub- 
stances to  each  other  in  regard  to  their  quantity  and  their  prop- 
erties. It  is  always  to  be  borne  in  mind,  however,  that  the  laws 


126  THE    WISDOM    DISPLAYED    IN   THE 

which  come  under  our  notice  in  chemistry  are  those  of  chemical 
affinity,  and  not  of  mechanical  force :  and  all  existing  compound 
bodies  result  from  the  adjustment  of  the  particles  of  matter,  in 
respect  of  their  rules  of  elective  affinity.  As  all  actual  phenom- 
ena are  complex,  the  resolution  of  them  into  their  elements  re- 
quires steady  apprehensions  of  that  on  which  their  present  nature 
depends,  and  in  particular  on  the  laws  of  elective  affinity  and  on 
•quantity,  (which  is  measured  by  weight;)  and  this,  not  because 
laws  of  phenomena  are  ideas  superinduced  upon  facts,  but  because 
they  are  the  result  of  the  relations  which  the  facts  bear  one  to 
another. 

SECTION  IV.— WISDOM  DISPLAYED  IN  THE  PREVALENCE  OF  GENE- 
RAL  LAWS,  AND  OBSERVABLE  ORDER  IN  THE  WORLD. 

All  the  material  objects  on  our  earth  seem  to  be  composed  of 
rather  more  than  sixty  elements.  We  think  that  we  can  dis- 
cover the  wisdom  of  God  in  creating,  as  the  elements  out  of  which 
existing  things  are  formed,  substances  sufficiently  numerous  to 
produce  variety,  and  yet  not  so  numerous  as  to  create  confusion. 
The  human  mind  is  so  formed,  that  it  delights  in  mingled  same- 
ness and  diversity  ;  and  we  are  furnished  with  as  much  variety 
as  the  finite  capacity  of  man  can  observe,  in  the  unnumbered 
compounds  formed  out  of  the  simple  ingredients ;  while,  on  the 
other  hand,  the  mind  is  kept  from  bewilderment  by  its  being  en- 
abled constantly  to  fall  back  upon  comparatively  few  principles. 
In  the  actually  existing  forms,  and  colors,  and  properties,  and  in- 
cessant changes  of  the  physical  world,  we  have  sufficient  variety 
and  novelty  to  delight  the  imagination  and  interest  the  curiosity ; 
we  have  flowers  of  every  shape  and  hue,  and  lovely  landscapes 
of  every  diversified  extent  and  character,  and  the  expressions  of 
beauty  in  the  human  form  and  countenance ;  while  the  under- 
standing feels  itself  secure,  and  science  has  a  solid  resting-place,  in 
falling  back  on  the  few  elements  to  which  all  things  can  be  re- 
duced. A  smaller  number  of  elements  would  not  have  supplied 
that  all  but  infinite  diversity  to  be  found  in  nature,  and  in  which 
the  human  heart  and  fancy  expatiate  with  such  delight ;  and,  on 
the  other  hand,  a  greater  number  of  elements,  while  it  could  not 
have  supplied  much  more  perceptible  variety,  would  have  con- 
founded scientific  inquiry,  and  puzzled  and  unsettled  the  judg- 
ment in  all  its  deeper  investigations.  There  is  much  the  same 
convenience  arising  from  a  limited  number  of  elements  in  nature. 


PREVALENCE  OP  GENERAL  LAWS-        127 

as  from  the  limited  number  of  letters  in  the  alphabet.  The  num- 
ber of  elements  is  no  doubt  about  double  the  number  of  letters  in 
the  common  alphabets,  but  this  is  only  in  congruity  with  the  ex- 
tent of  the  works  of  nature,  so  much  greater  than  the  range  of 
human  discourse.  In  the  one  case,  as  in  the  other,  the  numbei 
is  sufficiently  confined  to  give  precision,  and  sufficiently  large  tc 
furnish  an  inconceivable  variety.  Nor  is  it  unworthy  of  observa* 
tion,  that  as  there  are  certain  letters  which  occur  more  frequently, 
so  in  nature  certain  useful  elements  are  more  universally  dif- 
fused than  others,  and  all  for  the  convenience  of  those  who  em- 
ploy them. 

But  it  is  in  that  ordinance  of  heaven,  according  to  which  law 
universally  prevails,  that  we  discover  most  clearly  the  wisdom 
of  God.  In  particular,  we  may  observe  how  admirably  such  a 
system  is  adapted  to  the  nature  and  constitution  of  the  human 
mind. 

Many  piously-disposed  minds,  we  are  aware,  are  inclined  to  be 
jealous  of  the  discovery  of  law  in  the  universe.  Some  of  the 
ancient  philosophers  of  Greece  were  suspected  of  Atheism  and 
persecuted,  because  they  pointed  out  the  natural  causes  of  phe- 
nomena, which  the  vulgar  ascribe  to  special  miracles.  There  is 
still  a  lingering  suspicion  among  many  of  the  extent  to  which 
modern  scientific  research  is  inclined  to  push  the  reign  of  law. 
They  feel  as  if  science  was  setting  itself  up  as  a  rival  to  deity, 
and  attempting  to  drive  God  from  one  part  of  his  dominions  after 
another,  in  much  the  same  way  as  Rome  extended  itself  in  an- 
cient times,  making  conquest  upon  conquest,  and  always  under  a 
plausible  pretext,  and  in  the  hope  that  at  last  it  might  reign 
alone.  It  will  serve  to  remove  this  delusion  (for  such  we  reckon 
it,)  if  it  can  be  shown  that  there  is  admirable  wisdom  displayed 
by  the  Divine  Being  in  the  selection  of  this  particular  mode  of 
government. 

The  wisdom  of  this  method  appears  in  its  exact  adaptation  to 
the  nature  of  man.  Had  man  been  differently  constituted,  it  ia 
conceivable  that  a  different  system  might  have  been  preferable, 
It  is  possible,  or  probable,  that  there  may  be  somewhere  in  the 
universe  a  world  in  which  there  is  no  second  cause  of  the  event* 
that  are  occurring — no  other  cause  indeed  but  the  direct  exercise 
of  God's  will  But  if  there  be  such  a  state  of  things,  as  seems 
very  possible,  all  the  creatures  above  those  governed  by  mere  in- 
stinct— in  short,  all  intelligent  being — must  be  differently  con- 


128  THE    WISDOM    DISPLAYED    IN    THE 

stituted  from  man,  and  attain  knowledge  by  some  immediate  in- 
sight into  the  Divine  mind  or  purposes.  In  such  a  world,  man 
with  his  present  nature  would  feel  himself  to  be  a  stranger,  a 
wanderer,  and  an  outcast,  unsuited  to  all  around  him,  and  all 
around  unsuited  to  him. 

All  deep  and  sound  thinkers  acknowledge  that  there  is  an  in- 
ward principle  which  leads  us  on  the  discovery  of  an  effect  to  rise 
up  to 'a  belief  in  a- cause,  and  upon  observing  the  cause,  to  an- 
ticipate the  effect ;  and  that  this  principle  is  not  the  result  of  ex- 
perience, but  rather  the  foundation  on  which  we  proceed  in 
gathering  experience.  Now,  external  nature  is  in  exact  con- 
formity to  this  inward  principle.  What  we  are  led  by  our  intui- 
tions to  expect,  we  find  to  be  actually  realized.  Our  inward  be- 
lief is  ever  met  by  a  corresponding  connection  in  the  succession 
of  events.  Without  such  a  correspondence,  man  would  have 
wandered  forever  in  a  bewildering  maze,  finding  nothing  but 
contradictions,  and  at  war  with  the  whole  of  creation.* 

*  In  a  note  on  causation,  p.  94,  we  deemed  it  of  some  importance  to  institute  an  in- 
quiry into  the  relation  of  cause  and  effect  in  the  external  world.  In  doing  so,  we  care 
fully  avoided  making  any  reference  to  the  internal  principle  which  leads  us  to  discover 
and  believe  in  that  connection.  Nor  do  we  now  mean  to  enter  upon  that  qucstio 
vcxata  ;  we  would  avoid  at  least  all  the  minuter  points  of  controversy.  We  are  quite 
willing  to  adopt  either  the  view  of  the  Scottish  philosophers,  as  wrought  up  into  its 
most  refined  form  by  Brown,  or  that  of  Kant,  as  explained  and  illustrated  by  Cousin 
and  the  modern  Eclectic  School  of  France.  All  philosophers  do  now  acknowledge, 
that  there  is  an  internal  principle  which  necessitates  us  to  believe  in  the  connection 
between  cause  and  effect.  Reid  and  his  followers  regard  it  as  an  inborn  intuitive 
principle,  prior  to  all  belief,  and  regulating  belief.  Reid  placed  it  among  the  princi- 
ples of  common  sense,  (communis  sensus)  which  Stewart,  improving  the  nomencla- 
ture of  the  founder  of  his  school,  called  the  fundamental  principles  of  human  belief; 
and  which  Mackintosh,  by  a  farther  improvement,  called  the  fundamental  laws  of 
thought.  Sir  William  Hamilton  has,  in  the  way  of  defending  the  views  of  the  Scotch 
school  from  the  common  objections,  shown  the  conditions  of  the  legitimacy,  and  the 
legitimate  application  of  the  argument  from  common  sense,  and  pointed  out  the 
essential  characters  by  which  the  principles  of  common  sense  are  discriminated.  The 
German  philosophers  think  tlmt  they  have  given  this  principle  a  still  deeper  root  in 
the  human  mind,  and  have  been  able  to  rear  a  greater  growth  upon  it.  They  make 
this  principle  absolute  and  necessary;  and  involved  not  only  in  our  idea  of  the 
changes  of  material  substances,  but  in  our  very  idea  of  matter  itself.  We  stop  not  to 
inquire  which  of  these  rival  systems  is  the  correct.  Perhaps  the  difference  may  lie 
in  the  difference  of  the  classification  of  the  powers  and  principles  of  the  human  mind, 
rather  than  in  anv  difference  of  fundamental  truth.  The  question  of  the  superiority 
of  the  one  to  the  other,  is  to  be  determined  by  a  psychology  skilfully  conducted  in 
the  inductive  method,  rather  than  by  any  abstract  ontological  considerations.  For 
the  purpose  we  have  in  view,  we  are  satisfied  to  take  either  doctrine.  Both  doc- 
trines show  how  striking  the  adaptation  between  the  world  within  and  the  world 


PREVALENCE  OP  GENERAL  LAWS.  129 

But  there  is  a  farther  adaptation  between  the  external  and  in- 
ternal world.  It  is  conceivable  that  every  event  might  have 
fallen  out  according  to  the  relation  between  cause  and  effect,  and 
yet  that  there  might  have  been  no  sequences  in  nature  coming 
under  human  observation.  The  causes  of  the  effects  in  nature 
might  all  have  been  supernatural,  and  consisted  in  the  immediate 
volitions  of  deity,  or  of  angelic  beings,  or  in  physical  powers  beyond 
the  reach  of  man's  observation.  In  such  a  system,  there  would 
have  bjsen  nothing  contrary  to  man's  intuitive  principles,  just  as 
we  hold  that  there  is  nothing  inconsistent  with  them  in  the  mir- 
acles recorded  in  Scripture.  But  as  man  is  at  present  constituted, 
he  could  not  in  such  a  state  of  things  have  derived  any  knowledge 
from  experience.  The  past  could  have  thrown  no  light  upon  the 
future,  nor  could  any  steps  have  been  taken  for  the  attainment  of 
good  or  the  prevention  of  evil. 

Man  is  placed  in  a  system  of  things,  in  which  all  the  changes 
produced  in  the  objects  that  surround  him  occur  according  to  a 
relation  constituted  among  the  substances  changed.  In  using 
this  language,  we  mean  to  announce  something  more  than  the 
axiom,  that  every  effect  has  a  cause.  To  this  principle  there  can 
be  no  exceptions,  at  any  time  or  place.  The  miraculous  inter- 
positions recorded  in  Scripture,  are  not  inconsistent  with  this  fun- 
damental axiom,  for  they  are  the  effects  of  the  will  of  God  as  the 
cause.  But  in  speaking  of  the  visible"  universe,  as  all  connected 
together  by  the  relation  of  cause  and  effect,  we  enunciate  the 
farther  truth,  that  every  existing  phenomenon  (the  miracles  of 
Scripture  being  always  regarded  as  exceptions,  and  they  serve 
their  purpose  just  because  they  are  exceptions)  has  a  cause  in 
some  other  phenomenon  or  created  object.  God  has  so  consti- 
tuted this  world  that  every  effect  has  not  only  a  primary  cause  in 
the  will  of  God,  but  an  instrumental  cause  in  the  substances 
which  God  has  created  and  placed  in  the  same  mundane  sys- 
tem. Now,  all  this  is  in  admirable  adaptation  to  the  nature  of 
man,  who  attains  to  knowledge  and  power  by  means  of  the  cir- 
cumstance, that  all  things  are  happening  according  to  an  order 

without.  In  the  true  theory,  whatever  it  be,  the  intuitive  subjective  idea  will  be 
found  exactly  to  correspond  to  the  objective  relation.  If  we  do  not  mistake,  that 
theory  will  give,  as  the  first  fundamental  idea,  that  of  substance  and  quality,  as  im- 
plied in  the  very  nature  of  existence,  material  and  mental ;  and  as  the  second  funda- 
mental idea,  and  intimately  connected  with  the  first,  that  of  cause  and  effect,  as  im- 
plied in  all  changes  of  existences. 

9 


130  THE    WISDOM    DISPLAYED    IN   THE 

• 

which  he  can  observe,  and  of  which  he  can  take  advantage  in  all 
his  operations. 

The  adaptation  of  material  nature  to  man's  constitution  is  thus 
seen,  first,  in  the  circumstance,  that  every  event  has  a  cause ;  and 
secondly,  in  the  circumstance,  that  it  has  a  natural  cause.  But 
there  is  a  third  class  of  adaptations  which  strike  the  mind  still  more 
impressively.  We  refer  to  those  exhibited  by  the  general  laws  or 
results  which  come  under  our  notice  everywhere,  and  which  are 
the  production,  as  we  have  seen,  of  causes  ingeniously  adjusted 
to  each  other.  The  agents  of  nature  are  so  arranged  into  a  sys- 
tem, or  rather  a  system  of  systems,  that  events  fall  out  in  an 
orderly  manner.  The  seasons  roll  on,  for  instance,  and  with  them 
their  several  characteristics — the  bud  and  promise  of  spring,  the 
full-blown  beauty  of  summer,  and  the  fruitful  riches  of  autumn— 
all  terminating  in  the  gloomy  night  of  winter,  in  which  nature 
rests  and  prepares  for  a  new  exertion ;  and  this,  not  because  the 
phenomena  proceed  from  one  isolated  cause,  but  because  a  vast 
variety  of  independent  agents  are  made  to  conspire  for  the  pro- 
duction of  one  end.  These  general  laws  are  the  grand  means  of 
enabling  us  to  anticipate  the  future,  and  to  take  steps  for  the  ac- 
complishment of  our  purposes,  whether  in  the  prevention  of  evil, 
or  in  the  securing  of  that  which  is  good. 

And  these  general  laws,  regulating  the  succession  of  events,  are 
merely  one  species  of  a  lafger  and  most  comprehensive  genus. 
We  find  in  the  world,  not  only  such  general  laws  of  succession, 
but  ORDER  under  a  vast  variety  of  forms,  and  all  apparently  with 
the  view  of  inducing  mankind  to  put  trust  in  nature,  and  enabling 
them  to  multiply  their  knowledge  and  experience. 

Had  there  been  no  common  points  of  resemblance  between  the 
innumerable  objects  met  with  in  nature,  man  must  have  continued 
iu  a  state  of  helpless  ignorance.  He  would  have  felt  in  much  the 
same  way  as  when  carried  into  a  large  wareroom  where  every 
article  is  in  confusion,  or  rather  where  every  article  is  not 
only  in  confusion,  but  incapable,  even  by  the  greatest  pains, 
of  being  arranged  with  any  other.  But  we  find  nature  instead 
full  of  an  order  which  can  be  observed  by  man.  By  means  of 
common  points  of  resemblance,  the  objects  can  be  grouped  and 
classified  for  the  assistance  of  the  memory  and  for  the  practical 
purposes  of  experience.  Here,  again,  let  us  remark  the  wonderful 
adaptation  of  mind  to  matter.  The  human  mind  is  so  constituted 
as  to  be  able  and  disposed  to  observe  relations,  and  especially  re- 


PREVALENCE  OP  GENERAL  LAWS.  131 

semblances,  and  so  to  group  objects  into  classes  by  means  of  these 
relations.  There  is  thus,  on  the  one  hand,  a  tendency  in  the 
human  mind  to  arrange  and  classify ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  the 
objects  around  us  have  multiplied  relations  one  towards  another, 
affording  befitting  exercise  for  the  intellectual  faculty,  and  enabling 
it  to  dispose  all  individual  substances  into  a  series  of  groups,  and 
to  connect  all  nature  in  one  sublime  system.  It  may  be  interest- 
ing to  trace  this  ordination  and  subordination,  and  to  observe  how 
it  prevails  most  in  those  natural  objects  with  which  man  is  most 
intimately  connected,  and  on  which  his  welfare  specially  depends, 

In  the  higher  kinds  of  inorganic  matter,  there  is  an  order  in  the 
shape  or  form,  as,  for  instance,  in  crystals,  and  minerals  crystallize 
according  to  fixed  law.  The  curious  phenomena  of  morphology, 
a  subject  which  has  of  late  years  been  engaging  the  attention  of 
scientific  inquirers,  indicate  that  certain  forms  pervade  nature,  and 
all  for  the  purpose  of  assisting  the  eye  and  mind  of  man,  and  ena- 
bling him  to  recognize  and  to  use  to  advantage  the  works  of  God* 

Rising  to  organic  matter,  we  find  this  order  becoming  still  more 
universal  Symmetry  prevails  in  every  part  of  the  vegetable  and 
animal  kingdoms.  "  The  fotm  of  a  living  body,"  says  Cuvier, 
"  is  still  more  essential  to  it  than  its  matter."  The  bodies  of  ani- 
mals consist  of  two  equal  and  similar  sects  of  members,  the  right 
and  the  left  side;  and  many  flowers  consist  of  three  or  five  equal 
sets  of  organs,  similarly  and  equally  disposed*  The  iris,  for  in- 
stance, has  three  straight  petals,  arid  three  reflexed  ones  alternately 
disposed;  and 'the  rose  has  five  equal  and  similar  sepals  of  the 
«alyx,  and  alternating  with  these  as  many  petals  of  the  corolla. 
The  normal  types  of  the  vegetable  kingdom  are  triangular  and 
pentagonal.  In  monocotyledinous  plants,  the  symmetry  is  three ; 
and  in  dicotyledinous,  it  is  five.  "  This  great  numerical  distinc- 
tion," says  Whewell,  "corresponding  to  a  leading  difference  of 
physiological  structure,  cannot  but  be  considered  as  a  highly  curi- 
ous  fact  in  phytology.  Such  properties  of  numbers  thus  connected 
in  an  incomprehensible  manner  with  fundamental  and  extensive 
laws  of  nature,  give  to  number  an  appearance  of  mysterious  im- 
portance and  efficacy."  * 

The  simple  symmetry — that  is,  with  the  right  and  left  side 

alike,  as  it  is  found  in  minerals,  so  it  becomes  more  frequent,  both 

among  plants  and  animals.     The  oblong,  or  two  and  two  mem- 

bered  symmetry,  may  be  traced  extensively  among  crystals  and 

*  Whewell's  PhiL  of  Ind.  Sciences,  voL  ii.  p.  24. 


132  THE    WISDOM    DISPLAYED    IN  THE 

flowers,  as  may  also  the  three  membered  symmetry,  which  espe- 
cially abounds  in  the  vegetable  kingdom.  The  square  is  a  common 
form  in  crystals,  but  does  not  seem  suited  to  vegetable  or  animal 
organization.  The  pentagonal  is  found  to  a  limited  extent  in  the 
animal  kingdom,  and  is  by  far  the  most  common  among  flowers. 

Now,  it  is  not  difficult,  we  think,  to  discover  the  final  cause  of 
this  numerical  and  symmetrical  order.  It  serves  the  same  benefi- 
cent ends  as  those  general  laws  of  succession  which  we  have  been 
contemplating.  It  makes  nature  a  familiar  friend  to  us.  It  en- 
ables us  to  recognize  and  arrange  the  various  objects  by  which  we 
are  surrounded,  and  to  turn  them  to  their  proper  uses.  All  this 
appears  the  more  evident  to  us,  when  we  learn  that  "  all  the 
symmetrical  members  of  a  natural  product  are  under  like  circum- 
stances alike  affected."  It  is  confirmatory  of  these  views  to  find, 
that  as  we  pass  from  the  lower  inorganic  to  the  higher  inorganic — 
such  as  crystals,  jewels,  and  metals — and  when  we  rise  from  the 
inorganic  to  the  organic,  such  symmetry  becomes  more  prevalent 
and  obvious,  and  apparently  for  the  purpose  of  enabling  us  to 
observe  and  group  these  more  important  departments  of  nature. 

This  order  is,  no  doubt,  intended  primarily  and  mainly  for 
practical  purposes.  Hence  it  is  an  order  which  strikes  the  senses, 
and  which  can  be  easily  observed  and  remembered.  It  is  also  the 
means  by  which  science  is  enabled  to  construct  its  systems.  Sci- 
entific inquirers  do  indeed  complain  that  there  is  a  difficulty  in 
finding  a  classification  at  once  simple,  correct,  and  complete  of  the 
objects  in  the  mineral,  vegetable,  and  animal  kingdoms.  Still 
there  are  numerous  facilities  furnished  for  such  a  classification, 
in  the  obvious  order  which  prevails  in  nature;  and  any  difficulties 
that  may  present  themselves  to  the  rigid  logician,  arise  mainly, 
we  are  convinced,  from  the  circumstance  that  nature  hath  con- 
structed her  forms  chiefly  for  practical  ends  ;  and  she  will  not,  in 
order  to  suit  our  modes  of  reasoning,  keep  rigidly  to  a  rule,  when 
an  anomaly  might  be  more  useful  to  the  common  observer,  or  tend 
more  effectually  to  promote  the  functions  of  the  animal  or  plant. 
A  systematist  would  arrange  all  insects  into  those  that  have  wings 
and  those  that  have  none ;  but  is  mortified  beyond  measure  when 
he  discovers,  that  in  the  case  of  the  glow-worm  and  certain  species 
of  moths,  the  male  has  wings,  while  the  female  is  without  them  ; 
and  his  principle,  if  carried  out,  would  compel  him  sometimes  to  put 
the  one  sex  in  one  division,  and  the  other  sex  of  the  same  species 
in  another.  In  all  such  cases  it  will  be  found,  that  as  there  is  a 


PREVALENCE    OP    GENERAL    LAWS.  133 

beneficent  end  served  by  the  general  order  that  prevails,  so  there 
is  also  some  good  purpose  accomplished  by  the  apparent  anomaly. 
In  so  far  as  plants  and  animals  are  concerned,  we  can  easily 
understand  how,  with  an  order  sufficient  for  all  practical  purposes, 
there  should  yet  be  a  call  to  depart  from  it,  to  a  greater  or  less 
extent  to  suit  the  climate  and  situation,  and  to  promote  the  com- 
fort of  the  living  being.  So  far  as  the  objects  contemplated  in 
natural  philosophy  are  concerned,  there  needs  no  such  divergence 
and  this  may  be  the  reason  why,  when  natural  history  has  always 
somewhat  of  looseness  in  its  laws,  those  of  such  sciences  as  astron- 
omy and  mechanics  are  scientifically  and  mathematically  correct. 

In  the  end  it  will  be  found,  that  the  natural  classifications,  both 
in  the  animal  and  vegetable  kingdoms,  as  they  are  the  more  ser- 
viceable, so  they  are  also  the  more  scientific.  Rather  than  adopt 
a  purely  artificial  system,  however  beautiful  and  ingenious,  it  is 
vastly  better  in  our  view  at  once  to  take  the  natural,  though  in 
some  respects,  imperfect  system,  and  embody  in  it  a  full  statement 
of  the  exceptions  and  anomalies  under  the  head  of  variations. 
"The  truth  is,"  says  Swainson,  "that,  generally  speaking,  an 
unscientific  person,  but  with  a  discriminating  eye,  is  much  more 
likely  to  assort  objects  into  natural  assemblages  than  one  whose 
ideas  are  shackled  by  the  dogmas  of  nomenclators,  and  the  pre- 
judices of  systematists.  Nature,  in  the  midst  of  her  astonishing 
endless  diversities  of  forms,  still  seems  to  delight  in  preserving  a 
marked  degree  of  uniformity  and  consistency  in  her  own  groups, 
not  only  in  regard  to  their  habits  and  general  structure,  but  in 
such  things  as  are  most  likely  to  strike  common  observers — such 
as  size,  color,  and  geographic  distribution.  She  rarely,  if  ever, 
places  in  the  same  genus  animals  of  any  striking  disproportion  m 
their  dimensions."  *  The  same  author  goes  on  to  state,  that  the 
best  characters  for  groups  are  those  drawn  from  their  external 
aspect ;  and  that  having  got  a  confessedly  natural  group  with  its 
general  characters,  we  are  then  to  descend  to  its  variations. 

In  organic  life,  while  all  is  order,  yet  it  is  an  order  in  the  midst 
of  variety ;  and  this  is  ever  to  be  borne  in  mind,  an  order  amidst 
multiplicity  and  diversity  to  assist  the  memory  and  the  judgment. 
It  is  not  needful,  however,  in  furthering  this  end,  that  the  order 
should  be  so  very  precise  as  a  "minute  philosopher"  (to  use  a 
phrase  of  Bishop  Berkely)  would  make  it.  Just  as  in  modern 
gardening,  order  is  not  less  attended  to,  while  it  is  far  less  visible 

*  Dis.  Studv  Nat.  His. 


134  THE    WISDOM    DISPLAYED    IN    THE 

than  it  was,  when  every  line  was  straight  and  every  parterre 
squared  and  every  tree  cut  into  shape ;  so  in  the  works  of  Godr 
the  order  is  not  less  beautiful  and  bountiful,  because  it  is  not  pre- 
cise. It  is  evidently  intended,  that  with  a  reigning  symmetry, 
there  should  be  much  room  for  divergence  on  all  sides,  in  order  to 
accomplish  every  beneficent  purpose.  Hence,  we  find  that  the 
system  of  order,  adopted  both  in  the  animal  and  vegetable  king- 
doms, admits  of  this  divergence.  "In  animal  groups,  the  class  is 
steadily  fixed,  though  not  precisely  limited  'T  it  is  given,  though 
not  circumscribed ;  it  is  determined,  not  by  a  boundary  line  with- 
out, but  a  central  point  within  -  not  by  what  it  strictly  excludes,  but 
by  what  it  eminently  includes ;  by  an  example,  not  by  a  precept ; 
— in  short,  instead  of  a  definition,  we  have  a  type  for  our  director. 
A  type  is  an  example  of  a  class,  which  is  considered  as  eminently 
possessing  the  characters  of  the  class."*  The  animal  kingdom- 
is  distributed  by  naturalists  according  to  external  marks,  the  radi- 
ata  having  their  parts  arranged  around  a  common  centre,  the 
mollusca  being  enclosed  wholly  or  partially  in  a  muscular  enve- 
lope, the  articulata  being  jointed,  and  the  vertebrata  possessing  a 
spinal  column.  In  regard  to  vertebrata?  the  class  falling  most 
frequently  under  human  inspection,  it  is  instructive  to  observe 
that  their  sub-divisions  into  fishes,  reptiles,  birds,  and  mammals, 
are  made  agreeably  to  visible  and  tangible  characteristics.  Con- 
formity of  structure,  indeed,  has  been  the  leading  principle  of 
classification  in  zoology  from  the  time  of  Aristotle  to  that  of 
Cuvier.  "Descriptive  botany  and  zoology,"  says  Hum  bold  t,  "  are, 
in  strict  definition,  merely  analytical  classifications  of  animal  and 
vegetable  forms."  "  An  organized  body  possesses  a  definite  form 
and  disposition,  not  only  as  regards  its  component  parts,  but  like- 
wise when  viewed  as  a  whole.  Each  organized  body  has  its 
appropriate  and  specific  shape,  and  to  each  a  certain  size  is  as- 
signed. To  observe  and  classify  the  wonderful  diversity  of  form 
exhibited  by  plants  and  animals  has  given  employment  to  natu- 
ralists in  all  ages,  and  the  sciences  of  zoology  and  systematic 
botany  have  been  founded  on  the  result  of  their  labors."! 

We  are  not  of  those  who  put  much  faith  in  the  physio-philosophy 
of  Oken ;  still,  it  seems  to  be  acknowledged  that  he  opened  up  the 
way  to  several  discoveries,  and  he  did  so  in  consequence  of  pos- 
sessing a  strong  intuitive  sense  of  order.  According  to  him.  classes 

*  Whe well's  Phil.,  vol.  i.  p.  470. 

f  Todd  and  Bowman's  Physiology,  vol.  L  p.  10. 


PREVALENCE  OF  GENERAL  LAWS.  135 

of  animals  are  represented  by  their  characteristic  senses.  The 
skin  represents  the  invertebrata ;  the  tongue,  making  its  appear- 
ance first  in  fishes,  is  the  symbol  of  this  class ;  the  nose  opening 
for  the  first  time  in  reptiles,  and  the  ears  in  birds,  may  be  taken 
as  the  characteristics  of  these  divisions ;  while  the  eye  may  be 
held  as  the  representative  of  mammalia,  because  appearing  in 
them  with  the  power  of  motion  and  lids.  We  allude  to  these 
speculations  merely  as  enabling  us  appropriately  to  remark,  that 
naturalists  of  every  class  fix  on  palpable  marks  as  the  grounds  of 
their  classifications — a  circumstance  which  shows,  that  they  all 
believe  that  God  has  given  us  such  palpable  marks,  to  enable  us 
to  recognize  and  arrange  his  works. 

Professor  Owen,  comparing  the  bones  of  the  fore-arm  of  various 
animals,  as  the  dugong,  the  bat,  the  mole,  the  horse,  and  man, 
seems  to  think  that  he  has  discovered  a  harmony  in  the  structure 
of  this  member,  such  as  could  not  proceed  from  a  mere  regard  to 
final  causes.  We  are  prepared  to  believe  in  the  truth  and  im- 
portance of  this  remark,  provided  it  be  so  far  qualified  as  to  make 
it  relate  merely  to  final  causes  having  a  reference  to  the  well-being 
of  the  animal.  There  seems  to  be  a  harmony  in  the  structure  of 
animals  which  is  in  no  way  promotive  of  the  welfare  of  the  indi- 
vidual living  being,  or  even  of  the  whole  race.  We  are  inclined 
to  hold  with  Owen  that  we  can  account  for  the  hornology,  only 
by  supposing  that  there  are  typical  forms  at  the  basis  of  animal 
nature,  which  types  may  be  common  to  us  with  other  worlds. 
Throughout  the  whole  vertebrate  series  there  is  a  predetermined 
pattern  in  the  structure  of  the  limbs,  and  we  believe  the  same  will 
be  found  in  every  other  part  of  the  animal  frame.  There  is  truth, 
then,  as  well  as  poetry  in  the  Platonic  idea  of  things  being 
formed  after  original  archetypes.  But  we  hold,  at  the  same  time, 
that  these  archetypes  are  not  uncreated,  as  Plato  seems  to  sup- 
pose ;  we  maintain  that  they  have  no  necessary  or  independent 
existence,  but  that  they  are  the  product  of  Divine  wisdom  ;  and 
that  we  can  discover  a  final  cause  for  their  prevalence,  .not,  indeed, 
in  the  mere  convenience  and  comfort  of  the  animal,  but  in  the 
aid  furnished  to  those  created  intelligences  who  are  expected  to 
contemplate  and  admire  these  predetermined  forms.* 

*  See  Owen's  Discourse  on  the  Nature  of  Limbs,  (Feb.  1849.)  That  every  part 
of  the  animal  frame  is  suited  to  the  functions  and  the  sphere  of  life  of  the  species  Ls 
a  truth  admitted  by  all  eminent  physiologists  ;  and  we  are  not  prepared  to  believe, 
that  there  are  any  exceptions  to  the  rule.  But  Owen  has  stated  another  great  truth, 


136  THE    WISDOM    DISPLAYED    IN   THE 

The  prevalence  of  these  archetypal  forms  gives  to  nature  a  par- 
ticular aspect,  by  which  we  easily  recognize  it.  and  can  at  once 
distinguish  between  the  works  of  God  and  the  works  of  man.  Na- 
ture has  not  only  its  peculiar  physiology  or  connection  of  structure, 
it  has  its  peculiar  physiognomy  of  characteristic  countenance. 
Every  observer  will  be  prepared  to  acknowledge  at  once  the  truth 
of  two  favorite  remarks  of  Humboldt,  that  every  particular  region 
of  the  earth  has  its  particular  aspect,  and  that  the  cosmos,  as  a 
whole,  has  a  unity  of  aspect.  "  Notwithstanding  a  certain  free- 
when  he  affirms  that  there  are  archetypal  forms  attended  to  in  the  structure  of  the 
animal  frame,  and  of  all  its  organs.  These  two  truths  are  not  contrary,  but  coinci- 
dent, and  each  rests  on  its  separate  evidence.  There  is  an  exemplar  of  the  animal 
skeleton  appearing  and  re-appearing  in  the  whole  vertebrata,  and  throughout  widely 
separated  geological  ages.  This  ideal  plan  is,  no  doubt,  accommodated  with  wonder- 
ful skill  to  the  particular  position  and  functions  of  the  species ;  but  there  is,  at  the 
same  time,  a  "  unity  of  plan  at  the  bottom  of  all  the  adaptive  modifications."  Owen 
shows  how  much  the  works  of  nature  differ  in  this  respect  from  those  of  man.  "  By 
whatever  means  or  instruments  man  aids  or  supersedes  his  natural  locomotive  organs, 
such  instruments  are  adapted  expressly  and  immediately  to  the  end  proposed.  He 
does  not  fetter  himself  by  the  trammels  of  any  common  type  of  locomotive  instru- 
ment, and  increase  his  pains  by  having  to  adjust  the  parts,  and  compensate  their  pro- 
portions, so  as  best  to  perform  the  end  required,  without  deviating  from  the  pattern 
previously  laid  down  for  all.  There  is  no  community  of  plan  or  structure  between  the 
boat  and  the  balloon— between  Stephenson's  locomotive  engine,  and  Brunei's  tunnel- 
ling machinery.  A  very  remote  analogy,  if  any,  can  be  traced  between  the  instru- 
ments devised  by  man  to  travel  in  the  air,  or  on  the  sea,  through  the  earth,  or  along  its 
surface."  But  as  he  goes  on  to  show,  there  are  in  the  animal  frame  bones  and  joints, 
which  in  their  order  and  collocation  give  indication,  njjt  only  of  adaptation  to  the  func- 
tions of  the  animal,  but  of  accommodation  to  a  grand  general  plan  reigning  through  all 
animal  life.  There  is  a  conformity  of  structure  running  through  the  fins  of  the  fish, 
the  wings  of  the  bird,  the  fore-feet  of  the  reptile  and  mammal,  and  the  arms  of  man. 
Every  segment,  and  almost  every  bone  which  is  present  in  the  human  hand  and  arm, 
exists  also  in  the  fin  of  the  whale,  though  they  do  not  seem  required  for  the  support 
and  movements  of  that  undivided  and  inflexible  paddle.  A  special  parallelism  can 
be  traced  between  the  fore  and  hind  limbs  of  the  same  species,  no  matter  to  what 
diversity  of  office  they  may  be  severally  adapted.  Thus  the  normal  or  typical  num- 
ber of  carpal  bones  is  ten,  or  five  in  each  row,  corresponding  to  the  typical  number 
of  the  digits.  We  can  point  out  the  finger  in  the  hand  of  man,  which  answers  to  the 
fore-foot  of  the  horse ;  and  the  toe,  which  corresponds  to  its  hind  foot — nay,  the  very 
nail  in  the  hand  or  foot,  which  becomes  by  excess  of  development  above  the  type,  the 
great  hoof  of  the  horse.  And  why  this  difference,  so  well  pointed  out  by  Owen,  be- 
tween divine  and  human  workmanship  ?  It  is  not,  as  the  learned  anatomist  seems  to 
think,  because  God  has  not  a  final  cause  in  each  of  his  operations ;  but  it  is  because, 
while  man,  with  his  limited  faculties,  has  only  one  end  in  view,  the  omniscient  Crea- 
tor has  two  ends — one  bearing  reference  to  the  animal  functions,  and  another,  and  that 
a  scarcely  less  important  one,  to  the  intelligence  of  his  intelligent  creation.  How 
could  the  common  observer  recognize  and  distinguish  the  animal  races !  How  could 
Owen  make  his  discoveries,  but  by  the  help  of  such  a  principle  I 


PREVALENCE    OF    GENERAL    LAWS.  137 

dom,"  says  he,  "  of  development  of  the  several  parts,  the  primitive 
force  of  organization  binds  all  animal  and  vegetable  forms  to 
fixed  and  constantly  recurring  types,  determining  in  every  zone 
the  character  that  peculiarly  appertains  to  it,  or  the  physiognomy 
of  nature."  "  Nature,"  says  Sir  Isaac  Newton,  "  is  very  constant, 
and  conformable  to  herself."  Paley  remarks  that  "there  is  a  cer- 
tain character  or  style  (if  I  may  use  the  expression)  in  the  opera- 
tions of  Divine  wisdom,  something  which  everywhere  announces, 
amidst  an  infinite  variety  of  detail,  an  inimitable  unity  and  har- 
mony of  design." 

It  is  the  prevalence  of  this  order — and  that  under  a  somewhat 
different  form,  the  form  of  development — which  enabled  a  poet, 
with  a  fine  sense  of  analogy,  to  observe  laws  in  natural  history 
which  had  escaped  the  most  rigid  scientific  investigation.  The 
idea  of  a  leaf  as  a  type  transformed  into  the  various  forms  of  sta- 
mens, carpels,  &c.,  has  enabled  the  scientific  botanist  to  discover 
order  and  development  under  the  most  dissimilar  aspects,  and  ex- 
plain with  ease  the  great  variety  of  apparent  irregularities  which 
give  their  characters  to  many  tribes  of  plants.  The  theory  of 
Goethe  is  regarded  by  some,  as  having  had  a  greater  influence  in 
introducing  order  into  vegetable  physiology,  than  any  generaliza- 
tion ever  made  by  a  professional  savant. 

There  is  not  only  a  symmetrical,  there  is  a  numerical  order 
pervading  the  works  of  God,  and  this  to  promote  the  convenience 
and  growing  intelligence  of  mankind.  •  Every  person  must  have 
observed  how  often  certain  numbers,  such  as  three,  live,  seven, 
and  ten,  occur  and  recur  in  human  enumerations  and  transac- 
tions. Recourse  has  been  had  to  them  in  all  nations  and  lan- 
guages, and  superstition  has  declared  them  to  be  sacred,  and  phi- 
losophy represented  them  as  perfect;  and  this  circumstance  is 
sufficient  to  prove  that  they  are  advantageous.  The  fact  that 
corresponding  numbers  meet  us  in  the  animal  and  vegetable  king- 
doms, is  a  proof  of  the  skilful  adaptation  of  these  departments  of 
nature  to  the  wants  and  character  of  mankind. 

Just  as  conformity  of  structure  is  the  principle  of  classification  in 
natural  history,  so  numerical  order  is  the  basis  of  investigation  in 
chemistry  and  physics.  Just  as  nature  has  moulds  in  which  she 
casts  her  products  in  hftr  finished  form,  so  she  has  weights  and 
measures  by  which  she  gives  out  her  materials.  God,  at  the 
original  formation  of  all  things,  seems  really  to  have  "  weighed 
the  mountains  in  scales  and  the  hills  in  a  balance."  In  all  that 


138  THE    WISDOM    DISPLAYED    IN   THE 

is  subject  to  motion  and  change,  says  Humboldt,  mean  numerical 
values  are  the  ultimate  object — they  are,  indeed,  the  expression 
of  physical  laws,  they  show  us  the  constant  amid  change,  the 
stable  amidst  the  flow  of  phenomena.  The  advance  of  our  mod- 
ern physical  science,  which  proceeds  by  weight  or  measure,  is 
especially  characterized  by  the  attainment  and  progressive  recti- 
fication and  mean  values  of  certain  quantities.  The  only  re- 
maining and  wide-diffused  characters  of  our  present  writing — 
numbers — re-appear  as  once  in  the  Italian  school,  but  now,  in  a 
more  extended  sense,  as  powers  of  Cosmos. 

Chemistry  has  for  its  general  end  the  study  of  the  laws  of  the 
phenomena  of  composition  and  decomposition,  which  result  from 
the  molecular  and  specific  action  of  different  substances,  natural 
and  artificial,  the  one  upon  the  other.*  The  discovery  of  the 
law  of  definite  proportions  shows  us  that  numerical  order  is  the 
basis  of  the  science,  for  all  compositions  and  decompositions  take 
place  according  to  numerical  rule.  The  elements  of  nature  will 
not  combine  according  as  we  may  choose  to  mix  them,  but  only 
in  certain  definite  proportions ;  and  when  between  the  same  ele- 
ment several  combining  proportions  occur,  they  are  related  as 
multiples.  In  order  to  composition  we  must  have  the  elements 
in  their  fixed  proportions.  As  the  result  of  decomposition  we 
come  back  to  elements  in  a  numerical  relation.  Dalton  supposed 
that  this  composition  according  to  definite  proportions,  arose  from 
the  form  of  the  ultimate  atom ;  and  if  there  is  any  truth  in  his 
theory,  it  is  an  illustration  of  the  harmony  between  forms  and 
numbers. 

We  see  what  pains  God  has  taken  to  make  us  acquainted  with 
physical  objects,  and  put  confidence  in  nature.  If  you  look  at 
them  you  can  know  them,  as  you  know  the  faces  of  your  friends, 
by  their  features  and  expression.  Put  them  to  the  test,  and  they 
come  out  as  certain  steady  principles,  as  steadfast  as  the  most 
faithful  of  friends. 

In  physics  we  meet  with  the  same  principles  of  order.  The 
science  of  acoustics  is  founded  on  the  perceived  relation  between 
sound  and  numbers.  The  law  of  universal  gravitation  itself  is  a 
law  of  numbers,  being  inversely  according  to  the  square  of  the 
distance  of  the  bodies  that  are  attracted.  The  bodies  submitted 
to  this  law  of  numbers  are  so  arranged  as  to  produce  laws  of  form  ; 
and  these  bodies  have  all  a  particular  spheroidal  shape,  and  are 

*  Aug.  Comte. 


PREVALENCE  OP  GENERAL  LAWS.  139 

made  to  move  in  curves,  which  are  sections  of  the  cone.  The 
three  famous  laws  of  Kepler,  which  led  directly  to  the  Newtonian 
discovery,  and  which  are  still  of  immense  value  in  astronomy,  are 
laws  of  form  or  number.  These  laws  are — that  the  orbits  of  plan- 
ets are  elliptical,  that  the  areas  described  by  lines  drawn  from  the 
sun  to  the  planet  are  proportional  to  the  times  employed  in  the 
motion,  and  that  the  squares  of  the  periodic  times  are  as  the  cubes 
of  their  distances.  It  is  because  of  the  constant  presentation  of 
regular  forms  and  numbers  in  the  shapes  and  motions  of  the 
heavenly  bodies,  that  the  science  which  deals  with  forms  and  num- 
bers, i.  e.,  the  mathematics,  admits  of  such  universal  application 
to  astronomy.  It  is  from  similar  causes  that  we  find  geometrical 
symmetry  and  arithmetical  proportions,  casting  up  in  all  physical 
investigation.  Hence,  too,  the  power  to  which  science  has  at- 
tained of  weighing  accurately  the  sun  and  planets  with  their  sat- 
ellites. Forms  and  numbers  have  given  to  human  science  all  its 
success  and  astonishing  accuracy,  and  they  have  done  so  because 
fixed  forms  and  definite  numbers  universally  prevail  in  nature. 

We  can  now  understand  how,  in  the  minds  of  certain  mystic 
philosophers,  a  mysterious  importance  should  have  been  attached 
to  forms  and  numbers.  It  was  an  ancient  Pythagorean  maxim 
that  numbers  are  the  principia  of  the  universe,  and  that  things 
are  but  the  copies  of  numbers.  We  will  not  enter  upon  the  con- 
troversies which,  in  ancient  Greece  as  well  as  in  modern  Eu- 
rope, have  arrayed  ingenious  speculators  into  opposing  parties, 
because,  as  one  of  the  combatants  says,  "  we  are  unwilling  to 
spin  out  our  awaking  thoughts  into  the  phantasms  of  sleep, 
making  cables  of  cobwebs/'*  When  such  philosophers  as  Py- 
thagoras and  Plato,  not  to  mention  the  author  now  quoted,  have 
differed,  we  are  not  disposed  to  fix  on  the  perfect  or  radical  number 
of  the  universe.  We  refer  to  these  discussions,  which  the  super- 
ficial mind  of  modern  times  is  not  much  inclined,  we  suspect,  to 
appreciate,  for  the  purpose  of  bringing  out  the  great  truth  that 
regularity  pervades  the  world.  How  multiplied  the  traces  which 
ingenious  speculators  of  the  class  referred  to  have  discovered. 
Thie  has  shown  how  the  circle  or  sphere  bounds  the  shapes  and 
paths  of  the  heavenly  bodies,  and  many  of  the  stalks  and  flowers 
of  plants.  Another,  jealous  for  Christianity,  has  rather  delighted 
to  trace  the  form  of  the  cross  in  a  thousand  objects  in  every  clime, 
while  two,  three,  four,  and  five-fold  and  lozenge  and  network  fig- 
*  Brown's  Garden  of  Cyrus. 


140  THE    WISDOM    DISPLAYED    IN   THE 

ures  have  been  detected  in  every  department  of  nature,  and  given 
rise  to  rival  schools.  We  would  not  set  the  advocate  of  the  tri- 
angle against  the  supporter  of  the  circle  or  quincunx ;  but  we 
adopt  the  discoveries  of  all  into  our  eclectic  creed,  and  would  char- 
itably reconcile  all  feuds  between  men  whose  writings  now  slum- 
ber in  peace  amidst  dust  in  the  most  inaccessible  shelves  of  our 
libraries,  by  just  suggesting  that  all  these  forms  abound  in  nature, 
and  contribute  to  its  reigning  order.  Peace  be  to  the  ashes  of 
those  who  supported  their  cause  sometimes  with  warmth  as  ex- 
cessive as  their  ingenuity  !  We  honor  them  all  for  their  discove- 
ries, and  draw  from  their  learned  speculations  proofs  of  a  beauti- 
fully pervading  order  in  the  world,  suited  to  the  state  and  nature 
of  man,  and  fitted  to  minister  to  his  delight  and  increase  his 
knowledge. 

The  principle  that  reigns  in  nature  is  not  the  triangular,  the 
pentagonal,  or  cruciform,  nor  is  it  the  symmetrical  or  the  numeri- 
cal, but  it  is  the  principle  of  order,  and  that  towards  a  given  end— 
the  furtherance  of  knowledge  among  intelligent  creation.  It  is  this 
principle  of  order,  if  we  do  not  mistake,  which  gives  to  nature  that 
unity  which  reflecting  minds  have  ever  been  fond  of  observing. 

"  The  highest  and  most  important  result  of  the  investigation 
of  physical  phenomena,"  says  Humboldt,  "  is  the  knowledge  of 
the  connection  of  the  forces  of  nature,  the  deep  sense  of  their  in- 
ward dependence."  "  That  which  revealed  itself  first  to  the  inte- 
rior sense,  as  a  vague  presentiment  of  the  harmony  and  order  of 
the  universe,  presents  itself  to  the  soul  in  these  times  as  the  fruit 
of  long  and  anxious  observation."  Nature,  considered  rationally, 
that  is,  submitted  in  its  combination  to  the  investigation  of 
thought,  is  unity  amidst  diversity  of  phenomena,  harmony  amidst 
things  created  different  in  their  form,  their  proper  constitution, 
and  the  forces  that  animate  them,  it  is  the  whole  (r6  m**)  pene- 
trated by  the  breath  of  life."  But  we  doubt  much  if  this  philoso- 
pher, after  all,  has  determined  either  the  precise  nature  of  this 
unity,  or  the  origin  of  the  feeling  of  it.  He  seeks  for  the  ground 
of  the  unity  in  a  connection  of  forces,  and  talks  of  reducing  the 
immensity  of  different  phenomena  which  the  Cosmos  embraces, 
to  a  unity  of  principle.  Man,  he  acknowledges,  may  never  reach 
the  discovery  of  this  one  principle,  but  it  is  the  point  towards 
which  all  scientific  investigation  is  represented  by  him  as  tending. 
This  unity  of  nature  is,  in  our  view,  a  unity  of  order,  and  this 
unity  of  order  being  all-pervading,  reflecting  minds  in  every  age 


PREVALENCE    OF    GENERAL    LAWS.  141 

have  perceived  it,  and  all  minds  enamored  of  nature  have  felt  it. 
The  Greeks  embodied  their  perceptions  in  the  word  which  they 
employed  to  denote  visible  nature,  and  which  they  called  Cosmos, 
a  phrase  including  both  order  and  ornament,  and  the  Latins  in 
the  word  mundus,  a  phrase  much  less  expressive,  inasmuch  as  it 
does  not  characterize  the  former  of  these  elements.     The  ancient 
Ionian  physiologists  sought  to  explain  this  unity  by  referring  all 
things  to  some  one  physical  element,  and  delighted  to  trace  the 
metamorphosis  of  water  or  fire,  as  accounting  for  the  whole  phe- 
nomena of  the   universe.     Pythagoras   and   the  Italian   School 
sought  to  trace  this  unity  in  a  more  mystical,  but  to  some  extent, 
a  more  profoundly  exact  way,  to  numbers  and   forms.     Specula- 
tors in  modern  times  have  imagined  that  investigation  will  at 
length  disclose  some  great  logical  abstraction  or  physical  power  as 
the  origin  and  cause  of  this  unity.*     Now  this  unity,  if  we  do  not 
mistake,  is  just  to  be  traced  to  a  universal  order,  and  the  univer- 
sal appreciation  of  it  to  the  way  in  which  this  order  is  pressed 
upon  our  notice.     All  science  proceeds  upon  this  order,  and  genius 
has  ever  been  employed  in  unfolding  it.     Lofty  minds,  such  as 
those  of  Plato  and  Kepler,  have  at  times  erred  in  transferring 
their  own  ideas  of  order  to  the  objective  world ;  but  it  is  not  the 
less  true  that  this  order  permeates  all  nature,  and  that  all  discov- 
eries have  been  made  by  the  inquirer  setting  out  in  quest  of  it. 
But  this  unity  does  not  spring,  as  the  lonians  thought,  from  a 
unity  of  physical  element,  nor  from  the  inherent  power  of  figures 
and  numbers,  as  the  Pythagoreans  asserted,  nor  from  a  funda- 
mental logical  principle,  as  some  modern  German  metaphysicians 
seem  to  think,  nor  from  a  unity  of  physical  power  to  be  discovered 
some  time  or  other,   as  certain  physical  philosophers  appear  to 
imagine.     "  The  philosopher,"  says  Httmboldt,  "  arrives  at  last  at 
an  intimate  persuasion  of  one  indissoluble  chain  of  affinity  bind- 
ing together  all  nature."     The  one  principle  which  reigns  is  a 
principle  of   order  amidst  a  vast   number  of  elements,  but   all 
brought  by  it  into  subordination,  and  using  forms,  and  numbers, 
and  physical  forces,  only  as  its  principal  instruments,  and  tying 
nature,  not  as  an  indissoluble  chain,  but  as  the  string  keeps  to- 
gether the  bunch  of  flowers  until  they  wither.     It  is  the  same 
unity  as  there  is  in  a  well  laid  out  garden,  in  a  well  planned  build- 

*  Aug.  Comte  represents  the  positive  philosophy  as  tending  towards  representing 
different  observable  phenomena  as  the  particular  states  of  a  general  fact  like  that  of 
gravitation.  Vol.  i.  p.  5. 


142  THE    WISDOM    DISPLAYED    IN   THE 

ing,  with  this  only  difference,  that  in  these  it  is  a  mere  unity 
formed  among  previously  existing  materials,  whereas,  in  the 
works  of  God,  it  is  a  unity  in  the  original  composition  as  well  as 
in  the  construction  of  nature.  No  doubt  this  unity  of  order  im* 
plies  a  connection  of  forces,  but  a  connection  arranged  by  an  in- 
telligent mind  using  the  forces  to  effect  the  contemplated  end. 
This  unity  carries  us  up  to  the  Divine  unity,  of  which  it  is  a  proof, 
and  the  Divine  beneficence,  of  which  it  is  an  illustration.  That 
the  mind  of  Humboldt,  stored  with  all  physical  knowledge  and 
human  learning,  should  have  swept,  as  on  angels'  wings,  through 
the  visible  universe  without  discovering  a  God,  or  at  least  without 
expressing  an  admiration  of  his  perfections,  is  the  most  lament- 
able proof  which  these  latter  ages  have  furnished,  of  the  true 
greatness  of  the  human  mind  in  itself,  and  of  its  accompanying 
spiritual  blindness. 

It  is  because  this  order  of  nature  has  to  accomplish  these  ends 
—  (it  is  a  mean  and  not  an  end) — that  it  is  not  like  the  classifica* 
tion  of  science — stiff,  rigid,  and  unbending — but  easy,  yielding, 
and  accommodating,  like  the  manners  of  the  man  who  is  thor- 
oughly polite  after  the  highest  mode,  and  who  sometimes  per- 
forms actions  contrary  to  the  rules  of  the  mere  formalist,  because 
he  acts  according  to  the  highest  rule  of  a  mind  of  delicate  feeling 
and  tact.  The  order  of  nature  is  a  varied  order  to  suit  the  varied 
circumstances.  It  is  an  order  which  will  not  sacrifice  the  end  in 
a  foolish  adherence  to  the  mere  means.  In  its  seeming  irregular- 
ities, it  may  be  disregarding  a  lesser  rule,  but  only  to  attend  to  the 
highest  rule  which  embraces  every  other.  It  is  atL-comprehen- 
sive  as  the  canopy  of  heaven ;  but  like  it,  too,  opens  as  we  become 
afraid  that  we  are  approaching  its  boundary. 

This  principle  of  order  is  universally  prevalent,  and  exhibits 
itself  under  a  great  many  other  forms  besides  those  of  shape  and 
number. 

Take  up  the  commonest  plant — the  furze  that  grows  on  the 
common,  the  sea-weed  that  clings  to  the  rocks  washed  by  the  ocean, 
or  the  fern  that  springs  up  in  the  mountain  glen — and  you  may 
observe  in  its  structure,  in  its  leaves,  or  pendicles,  a  wonderful  cor- 
respondence of  side  to  side,  and  part  to  part.  Let  the  eye  travel 
over  nature  as  we  walk  among-the  cultivated  fields,  or  the  grassy 
slopes  and  valleys  of  our  upland  countries,  or  among  the  thick 
woods  where  the  winds  have  strewn  the  seeds,  and  bush  and  tree  of 
every  kind  spring  up,  each  eager  to  maintain  its  place,  and  to  show 


PREVALENCE  OP  GENERAL  LAWS.  143 

its  separate  form  and  beauty — and  we  discover  an  order  in  every 
branch,  and  blade,  and  leaf,  and  shade,  and  color.  Take  up  a 
leaf  or  flower,  and  examine  it  with  or  without  the  aid  which  art 
can  furnish,  and  observe  how  one  edge  has  the  same  number  of 
notches  upon  it  as  the  other  edge,  and  what  nice  balancings  and 
counterpoises  there  are,  and  how  nicely  the  lines  and  dots  and 
shadings  of  color  suit  each  other,  and  recur  each  at  its  proper 
place,  as  if  all  had  been  done  by  the  most  exact  measurement, 
and  under  the  most  skilful  and  tasteful  eye.  Enter  the  rich  arbor 
or  the  cultivated  garden,  and  observe  how  the  flowers  have  been 
enlarged  and  improved  by  the  care  which  has  been  taken  of  them, 
and  in  this  gayer  color,  and  that  fuller  expanse  and  more  flowing 
drapery,  and  richer  fragrance,  mark  how  God,  who  rewards  us  foi 
opening  our  eyes  and  looking  abroad  on  his  works,  holds  out  a 
still  greater  reward  to  those  who  in  love  to  him,  or  in  love  to  them, 
take  pains  with  and  bestow  labor  upon  them. 

Rising  higher,  we  find  all  leading  events  in  the  earth  and 
heavens  to  run  in  periods.  Plants  have  their  seasons  for  budding, 
and  growing,  and  bearing  seed  and  fruit,  and  their  whole  existence 
is  for  an  allotted  time.  The  life  of  animals  and  of  man  himself 
is  a  period ;  and  it  has  its  periodic  developments  of  infancy,  youth, 
and  manhood,  and  old  age.  The  very  diseases  of  the  human 
frame  have  their  periods.  The  events  of  history,  in  respect  of 
politics,  civilization,  science,  literature,  and  religion,  can  be  ar- 
ranged into  cycles ;  and  as  a  whole  exhibit  a  regular,  though  a 
somewhat  complex  progression.  The  tides  of  the  ocean,  and  in 
many  places  the  currents,  flow  in  periods ;  and  in  some  countries, 
the  winds  blow  and  the  rains  fall  at  certain  regular  seasons.  The 
variations  of  magnetism  on  the  earth's  surface  seem  to  be  periodi- 
cal. The  changes  in  the  condition  of  the  earth  have  been  ar- 
ranged into  geological  epochs.  T\^f  year  is  a  period,  and  it  has 
its  seasons ;  and  there  are  magni  anni  in  the  movements  of  the 
planets,  and  the  revolutions  of  the  binary  and  multiple  stars,  and 
probably  also  in  the  movements  of  the  constellations  and  groups 
of  the  nebular  heavens. 

But  this  order,  thus  so  universal,  is  very  diversified.  It  will  not 
be  compressed  within  the  narrow  systems  which  men,  founding 
on  a  limited  experience,  are  in  the  way  of  forming,  or  suit  itself 
to  the  rigid  forms  of  human  logic.  It  embraces  time,  number, 
space,  forms,  colors,  and  force,  as  elements  employed,  and  it  blends 
these  together  in  unnumbered  ways.  Sometimes  its  rule  is  simple, 


144  THE    WISDOM    DISPLAYED    IN    THE 

and  at  other  times  of  great  complicity.  It  has  correspondences, 
analogies  more  or  less  striking,  parallelisms  and  antagonisms.  Its 
numbers  are  suited  to  its  shapes  and  colors,  and  its  forms  to  the 
position  in  which  they  are  placed ;  and  with  a  higher  than  human 
art,  it  weaves  its  divers  colored  weft  and  woof  into  figures  of  ex- 
quisite grace  and  beauty.  It  has  circles,  as  well  as  straight  lines, 
and  curves  of  all  variety  of  sweeps  ;  and  in  its  movements,  there 
are  turnings  and  windings  as  graceful  as  those  of  the  dance.  Its 
very  forces  are  orderly,  being  according  to  the  reciprocal  of  the 
square  of  the  distance  or  some  other  rule,  and  some  of  them  being 
polar  or  opposite  forces  in  opposite  directions.  Philosophers  and 
artists  have  sought  to  determine  the  line  of  beauty,  but  this  attempt 
has  been  futile ;  for  there  are  numberless  lines  of  beauty,  and 
there  is  a  beauty  which  does  riot  arise  from  lines  at  all,  but  from 
the  vast  number  of  other  agents  which  nature  employs  for  produ- 
cing its  order  and  accomplishing  its  beneficent  designs.  The  order 
of  nature  is  undoubtedly  a  systematic  order ;  but  it  is  like  the 
waving  lines,  which  we  admire  so  much  in  the  works  of  God  and 
the  higher  efforts  of  imitative  art,  its  indescribable  variety  is  an 
essential  part  of  the  system. 

Music  is  not  the  only  harmony  to  be  found  in  nature.  Poetry 
derives  its  power  to  please  from  the  love  of  harmony  which  is  so 
deep  in  our  natures ;  and  that  not  merely  in  the  ear,  for  the  deaf 
can  enjoy  it,  but  in  the  very  soul.  The  symbolism  of  the  ancient 
sages,  the  parallelisms  and  antagonisms  of  the  Hebrews  and  of 
the  East,  the  nicely  mixed  long  and  short  syllables  of  the  Greeks 
and  Romans,  the  correspondence  of  accents  and  the  number  of 
syllables  and  metres  among  the  modern  nations  of  Europe — all 
these  are  suited  to  principles  in  man's  nature,  and  show  how  di- 
versified poetry  may  be,  and  yet  be  true  poetry,  awakening  an 
echo  in  every  man's  bosom.  fJWe  like  not  the  rivalry  between  the 
various  schools — the  Eastern  school,  the  Greek  school,  and  the 
French  school,  or  the  Romantic  school,  the  Artistic  school,  and  the 
Lake  school  in  our  own  country — for  all  these  schools  speak  to 
symphonies  in  the  human  soul.  But  there  are  harmonies  in  the 
works  of  God  infinitely  more  varied  and  full,  and  in  still  more 
exquisite  adaptation  to  our  nature  than  those  of  poetry.  There  are 
symbols  employed  in  the  works,  as  well  as  by  the  prophets  of  God, 
as  when  the  ant  teaches  us  industry,  and  the  regular  periods  of  the 
sun  and  other  celestial  bodies  show  us  the  propriety  of  method  ;  or 
when  the  fertility  of  the  ground  reminds  us,  that  we  should  bring 


PREVALENCE    OP    GENERAL    LAWS.  145 

forth  fruit  unto  God ;  and  when  the  fading  leaf  tells  us,  that  we 
too  shall  soon  wither  and  be  blown  away.  What  wonderful  analo- 
gies and  conjunctions  and  antagonisms,  expected  arid  unexpected, 
does  nature  disclose  in  the  revolving  seasons,  and  alternating  sun- 
shine and  shade,  light  and  darkness,  and  in  the  coincidences  of 
Divine  providence,  in  prosperity  and  adversity,  the  hill  and  valley, 
the  level  plain  and  rugged  steep,  the  storm  and  calm  we  meet 
with  in  the  journey  of  life.  The  double,  triple,  and  quadruple, 
and  quintuple  forms  that  abound  in  the  works  of  God,  furnish  a 
greater  diversity  than  the  dimeters,  trimeters,  quadrameters,  and 
pentameters  of  the  poets.  In  providence,  as  in  poetic  art,  we  have 
the  rapid  and  the  slow — we  have  quick  dactyles  and  long  sound- 
ing spondees  alternating  with  each  other,  we  have  comedy  and 
tragedy,  the  laugh  of  pleasure,  and  the  wail  of  sorrow.  Though 
we  do  not  regard  human  poetry  as  merely  an  imitative  art,  for  it 
is  also  a  creative  art,  and  creates  harmonies  of  its  own,  yet  it  is 
fulfilling  one  of  its  noblest  functions  when  it  is  observing  and 
copying  the  harmonies  of  nature.  But  the  copies  ever  fall  beneath 
the  original ;  and  there  are  harmonies  in  the  works  of  God  which 
are  beyond  the  painter's  pencil  and  the  poet's  pen,  falling  upon  the 
soul  with  a  more  melodious  rhythm,  and  a  sweeter  cadence  than 
the  most  exquisite  music. 

And  here  we  have  to  express  our  regret,  that  philosophers  have 
not  been  able  to  agree  upon  a  theory  of  the  foundation  of  the  love 
of  the  beautiful.  Had  we  been  in  possession  of  such  an  estab- 
lished doctrine,  we  might  have  pointed  out  many  congruities 
between  the  harmonies  of  external  nature  and  the  internal  princi- 
ple which  leads  us  to  delight  in  the  lovely  and  sublime.  But  we 
are  unwilling  to  enter  upon  disputed  metaphysical  topics  ;  and  we 
must  be  content  with  marking,  in  a  general  way,  the  correspon- 
dence between  the  mental  taste  and  the  means  of  gratifying  it. 
Had  there  been  no  such  taste,  much  of  the  pains  bestowed  by  God 
upon  his  works,  in  their  graceful  forms  and  delicate  shades  of 
coloring  for  instance,  would  have  been  lost.  Had  there  been  no 
means  of  gratifying  it,  the  taste  would  have  been  worse  than  use- 
less ;  it  would  have  been  the  source  of  an  exquisite  pain — for  it 
would  ever  have  craved,  and  never  been  satisfied.  In  the  beautiful 
correspondence  between  the  two — between  the  taste  so  capable  of 
enjoyment,  and  so  susceptible,  too,  of  cultivation  and  increase,  and 
the  beauties  in  nature  around  us,  which  do  really  satisfy  the  long- 
ings of  the  heart,  deep  and  large  though  they  be — we  discover 

10 


146  THE    WISDOM    DISPLAYED    IN    THE 

how  much  God  has  multiplied  our  more  refined  and  elevated 
pleasures,  and  what  encouragements  he  hath  given  us  to  pursue 
them.  When  men  follow  mere  sensual  enjoyments,  the  more  eager 
their  pursuit,  they  become  the  more  incapable  of  relishing  them. 
It  is  different  with  the  love  of  the  beautiful,  (and  also  with  the 
love  of  the  good ;)  the  more  this  taste  is  exercised,  it  becomes  the 
stronger,  and  the  more  capable  of  enjoyment.  While  there  are 
limits  to  the  one,  and  punitive  restraints  appointed  by  God,  there 
seem  to  be  no  limits  to  the  other.  The  taste  grows  with  the 
growth  of  our  refinement  j  and  the  means  of  gratifying  it  are 
as  large  as  our  globe — nay,  to  sainted  beings,  may  be  as  wide  as 
a  boundless  universe. 

Let  us  mark,  too,  as  an  additional  proof  of  design,  the  divinely- 
appointe<J  connection  between  the  beneficent  and  the  beautiful. 
God  might  have  so  constituted  man  and  the  world  that  these  two 
had  been  totally  different ;  and  the  good,  approved  by  our  con- 
science, might  usually  or  always  have  been  repugnant  to  our 
natural  tastes  and  sensibility.  We  find  instead,  that  there  is  a 
correspondence  between  them.  Not  that  the  two  are  identical,  or 
even  parallel  in  every  respect.  In  the  human  species,  the  beauti- 
ful and  the  wicked  are  not  (infrequently  combined  in  the  same 
individual.  It  is  an  illustration  of  the  schism  that  sin  hath  intro- 
duced into  our  nature,  and  it  is  one  of  the  means  of  probation  by 
which  God  tries  us  in  this  mixed  state  of  things.  But  confining  our 
attention  to  the  principle  about  which  we  are  speaking — the  prin- 
ciple of  order — we  find  that  as  it  is  suited  to  our  intelligent,  it  is 
also  made  to  minister  to  the  gratification  of  our  emotional  nature. 
The  harmonies  which  aid  our  practical  sagacity,  and  which  en- 
able science  to  rise  to  its  grand  generalizations,  also  gratify  the 
taste,  and  enable  poetry  to  sing  some  of  its  loftiest  strains.  Hence 
it  is  that  the  useful,  through  the  power  of  association,  ministers  to  the 
love  of  the  beautiful.  The  symmetry  that  is  found  to  be  so  bene- 
ficial, comes  at  last  to  be  loved  for  its  own  sake  as  associated  with 
the  benefits  that  flow  from  it.  All  harmonies  come  to  be  pleasant 
to  the  mind  as  connected  with  the  idea  of  order,  and  the  blessings 
which  order  diffuses.*  Not  that  we  are  thereby,  as  some  imagine, 

*  One  class  of  speculators  maintain,  that  the  sense  of  beauty  is  a  simple  power  of 
the  human  mind,  and  that  there  is  a  beauteous  quality  in  the  external  object  corre- 
sponding to  the  inward  sense.  The  profound  thinkers  of  this  school,  when  asked  to 
point  out  the  quality,  point,  with  Augustine,  to  order  and  design — or  with  D'Alem- 
bert,  to  relations— or  with  Cousin,  to  unity  with  variety.  "The  true  theory  of 


PREVALENCE  OP  GENERAL  LAWS. 


147 


Enabled  to  rid  ourselves  of  an  intuitive  principle  of  taste  altogether. 
For  even  though  we  should  be  driven  to  acknowledge  (which  we 
do  not  acknowledge)  that  there  is  nothing  in  the  love  of  the  beau- 
tiful but  the  influence  of  association,  we  would,  in  the  very  sus- 
ceptibility of  such  associations,  and  of  a  pleasure  derived  from 
them,  discover  a  natural  principle  of  which  the  praise  belongs  to 
God  who  hath  so  constituted  us.  And  whatever  be  our  theory  of 
beauty,  we  may  discern  in  the  prevailing  harmonies  so  suited  to 
our  thirst  for  knowledge,  so  adapted  to  our  taste  for  the  beautiful, 
a  proof  of  the  beneficence  of  God,  who  hath  formed  the  world 
without  to  awaken  echoes  in  the  soul  within ;  and  to  promote  at  one 
and  the  same  time,  the  enlargement  of  the  experience,  the  quick- 
ening of  the  understanding,  and  the  refinement  of  the  feelings. 

Let  us  now  collect  into  one  system  the  adaptations  which  we 
have  been  observing  separately.  Let  us  observe  first  the  internal 
principles,  and  then  the  correspondence  of  the  external  facts  :— 


INTERNAL  PRINCIPLES. 
I.  The  natural  love  of  combined  variety 
and  sameness. 

II.  The  intuition  which  leads  us  to  con- 
nect cause  and  effect. 
JII.  The  attainment  of  knowledge  by  ex- 
perience. 


\  V.  The  faculties  that  generalise  and  clas- 
sify, in  order  to  the  attainment  of 
knowledge,   (1.)  practical,  and  (2.) 
scientific. 
V.  The  love  of  the  beautiful. 


EXTERNAL  FACTS. 

I.  The  number  of  -elements  sufficient 
to  produce  variety  without  confu- 
sion. 

II.  The  causal   connection  between  all 
events. 

III.  (1.)  All  phenomena  have  a  natural 

cause. 

(2.)  Material  substances  are  so  ad- 
justed, as  to  admit  of  their  act- 
ing causally. 

(3.)  Causes  are  so  adjusted  as  to 
produce  general  laws  of  succes- 
sion. 

IV.  The  principle  of   order  throughout 
the  world,   in    respect  of   number, 
ibrm,  color,  <fec. ;  and  this  order,  (1.) 
palpable  and  obvious,  (2.)  varied. 

V.  (1.)  The 'harmonies  in  nature. 

(2.)  These  harmonies  beneficent,  as 
well  as  beautiful. 


beauty  is  that  which  admits  unity  as  one  of  the  essential  elements,  but  which  also 
admits  of  diversity  as  no  less  essential.  Look  at  this  beautiful  flower.  It  is  without 
doubt  admirably  connected:  unity,  order,  proportion,  symmetry  are  there;  for  with- 
out these  qualities,  reason  would  be  absent,  and  all  things  are  made  with  a  wonder- 
ful reason.  But  at  the  same  time,  what  diversity,  what  grace  in  the  details,  what 
shades  in  the  colors,  and  riches  in  every  part.  We  know  not  whether  to  admire 
the  most— this  variety  always  new,  or  this  unity  everywhere  present" — Du  Beau, 
<Euvres,  p.  155. 


148  ON   THE    DIFFERENCE    BETWEEN    PHILOSOPHY  . 

With  such  proofs  as  these  of  the  benignity  of  law,  we  are  not 
jealous  of  the  discovery  of  it  in  the  government  of  the  world, 
We  rather  rejoice  in  every  extension  which  is  given  to  it ;  and 
feel  as  if,  by  enlarging  it,  we  were  restricting  the  supposed  do- 
mains of  chance,  and  widening  the  real  dominions  of  God,  and' 
doing  what  civilization  and  improving  agriculture  accomplish, 
when  they  g*rive  back  the  ignorance,  and  wastes,  and  wilds  of  our 
country  to  spread  knowledge,  and  order,  and  fertility  in  their  room. 

We  are  aware,  that  when  the  existence  of  God  is  denied,  it  is 
needful  so  to  define  and  explain  the  laws  of  nature  as  to  show 
that  they  are  not  a  substitute  for  the  Divine  Being.  But  when 
we  have  established  the  existence  of  God,  we  rejoice  to  discover 
the  presence  of  law  everywhere— as  much  as  Robinson  Crusoe  de- 
lighted to  detect  the  footsteps  of  human  beings  on  the  desolate 
island  on  which  he  was  cast ;  for  wherever  we  find  law,  there  we 
see  the  certain  traces  of  a  lawgiver. 

Care  must  be  taken,  however,  in  speaking  of  laws  as  so  univer- 
sal, not  to  represent  this  plan  of  procedure  as  separating  God  from 
his  works.  We  believe  God  to  be  as  intimately  connected  with 
the  operation  of  his  hands,  as  if  he  was  doing  all  by  special  mir- 
acle. Every  event  is  to  be  understood  as  ordered  by  God,  just  as 
certainly  as  if  it  had  taken  place  in  a  world  in  which  there  were 
no  other  causes  than  the  Divine  volitions. .  We  discover  that  the 
laws,  according  to  which  all  events  occur,  are  appointed  by  God ; 
and  we  can  farther  discover  the  exact  adaptation  of  this  arrange- 
ment to  the  nature  of  man  ;  and  instead  of  feeling  less  disposed 
to  see  God  in  his  works  because  of  this  constitution  of  things,  we 
are  all  the  more  inclined  to  discover,  and  when  we  discover,  to 
admire  his  wisdom  and  his  goodness.  But  this  subject  demands 
a  separate  section  for  its  consideration. 

We  cannot  close  this  section,  however,  without  showing  how 
the  principles  which  have  been  established  serve  to  explain  two 
subjects  not  devoid  of  interest  and  importance,  and  first,  the  DIF- 
FERENCE BETWEEN  PHILOSOPHICAL  OBSERVATION  AND  PRAC- 
TICAL SAGACITY. 

The  remarks  made  may  enable  us  to  understand  the  difference 
between  the  shrewd  observer  and  the  philosopher.  The  one  no- 
tices the  various  lesser  and  more  obvious  laws  of  the  occurrences 
in  the  world,  and  the  palpable  workings  of  human  nature ;  while 
the  other  rises  to  the  more  general  causes  from  which  they 
proceed. 


AND    PRACTICAL    SAGACITY.  149 

•The  person  who  has  observed  the  ways  of  the  world  around 
him,  becomes  a  man  of  shrewdness  and  sagacity  ;  and  in  regard 
to  the  pursuits  in  which  he  feels  an  interest,  his  vision  can  pene- 
trate to  an  astonishing  distance,  and  with  most  singular  accuracy. 
It  is  this  quality  which  leads,  according  to  the  object  to  which  it 
is  directed,  to  distinction  in  the  competitions  of  trade,  commerce, 
and  politics.  It  is  much  the  same  talent,  directed  to  a  higher 
class  of  objects,  which  produces  sagacity  in  historical  research. 
When  the  observer,  endowed  with  a  spiritual  vision,  takes  in  a 
higher  class  of  laws — the  laws  of  God's  providence — his  wisdom 
assumes  a  loftier  form ;  and  from  his  knowledge  of  the  Divine 
ways,  he  can  look  still  farther  into  the  future.  The  historian, 
Dr.  M'Crie,*  occurs  to  us  as  an  eminent  instance  of  an  individual 
possessing  this  species  of  sagacity,  and  able  to  anticipate  the 
events  that  are  to  come  from  a  knowledge  of  the  Divine  ways  in 
times  past.  Proverbs  of  a  worldly  or  a  divine  character  are  the 
forms  in  which  the  more  certain  of  the  general  observations  of 
which  we  are  speaking  find  their  appropriate  expression.  Wise 
sayings,  apothegms,  maxims,  and  pointed  remarks,  are  the  forms 
which  others  assume  ;  while  thousands  floating  in  the  mind,  and 
used  daily  by  the  sagacious,  have  never  been  expressed,  and  never 
will  be  expressed  in  words. 

The  philosopher  is  distinguished  from  these  shrewd  observers, 
in  so  far  as  he  seeks  for  the  causes  of  the  general  phenomena, 
which  present  themselves  in  the  actual  world.  Herein  is  Adam 
Smith  distinguished  from  the  practical  statesman  and  skilful  poli- 
tician. Herein  are  philosophic  historians,  such  as  Montesquieu ; 
and  Robertson,  in  his  introduction  to  Charles  V. ;  and  Guizot,  in 
his  works  on  Modern  Civilization ;  and  the  speculatists  of  Ger- 
many, who  arrange  all  events  into  epochs : — herein  are  these  dis- 
tinguished from  the  mere  recorders  of  events,  such  as  the  ancient 
chroniclers,  and  that  pictorial  school  which  claims  Sir  Walter 
Scott  for  their  founder. 

In  the  common  transactions  of  life,  the  power  of  shrewd  obser- 
vation is  infinitely  more  useful  than  philosophy.  We  know  not 
that  Adam  Smith  could  have  been  Prime  Minister  of  Great 
Britain,  though  his  writings  have  determined  the  destinies  of 
more  than  one  Cabinet.  On  the  other  hand,  the  views  of  the  en- 
lightened philosopher  will  be  found  in  the  end,  not  only  to  be  the : 
grander,  but  the  more  useful, .  for  he  proceeds  on  causes  exten- 
*  See  his  Life  by  his  Son. 


150  RELATION   OF   ART    AND    SCIENCE. 

sively  or  universally  operative.  The  genius  of  Adam  Smith  and 
Burke  will  ultimately  exercise  a  greater  sway  upon  the  laws  of 
the  kingdom,  and  the  sentiments  of  the  inhabitants,  than  the 
practical  wisdom  of  Pitt  and  Fox. 

It  may  be  expected,  that  the  man  whose  range  of  vision  is  con- 
fined, should  within  his  own  field  be  shrewder  than  others,  whose 
eyes  have  been  wandering  over  a  larger  surface.  He  who  has 
never  passed  beyond  his  native  valley  will  anticipate  the  events 
that  are  immediately  to  occur  in  that  valley  more  accurately  than 
the  individual  who  has  visited  every  quarter  of  the  globe.  The 
telescope  cannot  be  used  in  looking  at  the  blood-vessels  of  an  in- 
sect. On  the  other  hand,  the  microscope  cannot  be  employed  in 
resolving  the  nebulae  of  the  heavens  into  stars.  The  eye  that  is 
exquisitely  formed  for  observing  objects  which  are  small  and  nearr 
sees  large  and  distant  objects  dimly  and  confusedly.  The  observer 
who  is  sharp  enough  in  his  own  little  field,  falls  into  innumerable 
blunders  when  he  would  utter  general  truths  bearing  a  reference 
to  the  world  and  mankind  at  large.  The  wisdom  of  the  shrewd- 
est observer  of  men  and  manners  in  his  own  age,  appears  very 
contracted  to  the  student  of  universal  history.  The  latter  is  apt 
to  forget  that  even  his  wisdom  appears  narrow  and  short-sighted 
to  the  person  who  measures  all  things  on  the  scale  of  eternity.  It 
is  the  privilege  of  the  philosopher  rising  above  the  widest  observer 
on  the  common  elevations  of  the  earth,  to  contemplate,  as  from  a 
mountain  eminence,  the  general  shape  and  direction  of  all  events. 
But  rising  far  higher,  the  religious  philosopher,  contemplating 
these  causes  in  the  Divine  mind,  sees,  as  from  the  battlements  of 
heaven,  earth  and  time  with  all  their  revolutions  spread  out  be- 
neath him. 

These  principles  also  illustrate  the  RELATION  BETWEEN  SCI- 
ENCE AND  ART,  and  show  how,  while  art  commonly  precedes  sci- 
ence, yet  that  science  is  a  powerful  means  of  promoting  art. 

It  is  well  known,  that  art  has  in  general  preceded  science. 
There  were  bleaching,  and  dyeing,  and  tanning,  and  artificers  in 
copper  and  iron,  before  there  was  chemistry  to  explain  the  pro- 
cesses used.  Men  made  wine  before  there  was  any  theory  of  fer- 
mentation ;  and  glass  and  porcelain  were  manufactured  before  the 
nature  of  alkalis  and  earths  had  been  determined.  The  pyra- 
mids of  Nubia  and  Egypt,  the  palaces  and  sculptured  slabs  of 
Nineveh,  the  cyclopean  walls  of  Italy  and  Greece,  the  obelisks 
and  temples  of  India,  the  cromlechs  and  diruidical  circles  of  coun- 


CONNECTION    OP    GOD    WITH    HIS    WORKS.  15.1 

tries  formerly  Celtic,  all  preceded  the  sciences  of  mechanics  and 
architecture.  There  was  music  before  there  was  a  science  of 
acoustics ;  and  painting,  while  yet  there  was  no  theory  of  colors 
and  perspective. 

Nor  is  it  difficult  to  account  for  all  this  on  the  principles  which 
we  have  been  developing.  By  the  beneficent  arrangements  of 
God,  general  laws  available  for  practical  purposes  can  be  discov- 
ered, while  the  causes  that  produce  them  are  concealed.  The 
mechanic  and  artist  discover  these  general  laws,  and  turn  them 
immediately  to  the  object  which  they  contemplate — the  production 
of  useful  or  elegant  works.  God  has  so  disposed  the  agents  of 
nature,  that  these  laws  are  uniform  ;  and  so  long  as  they  are  so, 
the  artist  may  use  them  without  at  all  inquiring  into  the  cause ; 
and  all  the  while  no  attempts  may  have  been  made  to  discover 
the  cause,  or  science  may  have  been  defeated  in  all  its  attempts  to 
find  it.  At  the  same  time,  it  should  be  borne  in  rnind,  that  when 
science  succeeds  in  discovering  the  true  cause,  it  may  be  the  means 
of  multiplying  the  resources,  and  widening  indefinitely  the  do- 
minion of  art. 

As  a  practical  inference  from  the  train  of  reflection  which  we 
have  been  pursuing  in  these  corollaries,  let  us  mark  that  there  are 
obvious  and  palpable  laws  which  God  hath  placed  before  us,  both 
in  regard  to  the  workings  of  the  human  soul  and  the  mechanism 
of  nature,  and  all  to  aid  us  in  the  accomplishment  of  important 
practical  ends.  All  men  are  not  intended  to  be  philosophers,  but 
all  are  expected  to  be  practically  useful ;  and  hence,  while  there 
are  only  partial  aids  to  science,  there  are  universal  aids  to  in- 
dustry and  to  a  benevolent  activity.  The  philosopher,  when  he 
is  baffled  in  some  of  his  researches  into  more  recondite  causes, 
should,  in  the  spirit  of  a  true  philosophy,  comfort  himself  with  the 
thought  that  mankind  can  accomplish  so  many  important  ends, 
even  while  these  causes  are  yet  undiscovered. 

SECTION  V.— CONNECTION  OF  GOD  WITH  HIS  WORKS. 

Physical  inquirers,  in  prosecuting  their  method  of  induction, 
look  upon  all  things  from  a  particular  point  of  view — they  look  at 
them  from  the  earth  and  from  below,  and  their  views  are  in  con- 
sequence, to  some  extent,  narrow  and  contracted.  In  this  Treatise, 
without  departing  from  the  same  method  of  induction,  we  may, 
after  having  arrived  at  the  knowledge  of  the  existence  of  God, 


152  CONNECTION    OP    GOD    WITH    HIS    WORKS. 

look  at  all  things  from  another  and  a  higher  point  of  view,  we 
may  look  at  them  from  time  to  time  from  above.  Astronomers 
must  begin  their  investigations  by  taking  the  earth  as  their  basis, 
and  regard  it  as  their  centre ;  but  after  having  determined  in  this 
way  that  the  sun  is  the  true  centre  they  change  the  point  of  view, 
and  look  on  the  whole  planetary  system  from  the  sun  as  the  cen- 
tral point,  and  their  measurements  become  heliocentric  instead  of 
geocentric.  All  inquiries  into  heavenly  truth,  proceeding  in  an 
inductive  method,  must,  like  astronomers,  begin  with  the  earth ; 
but  after  having  proceeded  a  certain  length,  and  determined  that 
there  is  a  God,  they  may  view  all  things  as  from  heaven.  It  is 
when  surveyed  from  both  points  that  we  attain  the  clearest  idea 
of  their  exact  nature  and  relation  one  to  another,  and  to  God. 

The  finite  cannot  comprehend  the  infinite,  and  so  no*  man 
should  presume  to  point  out  all  the  ways  in  which  a  God  of  un- 
bounded resources  might  govern  the  universe.  According  to  the 
well-known  Theodicee  of  Leibnitz,  God  had  had  before  him,  in 
the  depths  of  eternity,  an  infinite  number  of  possible  worlds,  and 
out  of  these  selected  the  one  which  was  most  beneficent.  What- 
ever may  be  thought  of  this  ingenious  speculation,  it  is  evident 
that  God  might  have  governed  the  universe  after  a  different  mode 
of  administration  from  that  actually  employed.  It  is  conceivable, 
in  particular,  that  he  might  have  ordered  the  affairs  of  this  world 
in  some  other  way  than  by  the  method  of  general  laws. 

Superficial  thinkers,  disposed  to  materialism  and  atheism,  are 
apt  to  conclude  that  there  is  a  necessity  of  some  kind  for  the  ex- 
istence of  these  laws.  But  we  have  only  to  view  creation,  from 
the  point  from  which  God  surveyed  it  at  its  creation,  to  discover 
that  it  was  at  least  possible  for  God  to  act  after  a  different  method. 
The  determination  to  govern  the  world  by  general  laws  was  an 
act  of  the  Divine  mind,  swayed  by  all-wise  reasons  and  motives, 
and  not  at  all  by  stern  necessity. 

It  does  not  even  appear  that,  in  selecting  such  a  method,  God 
could  have  been  influenced  by  considerations  of  convenience. 
We  might,  on  a  cursory  view,  be  tempted  to  conclude  that  God 
must  have  adopted  such  a  mode  of  operation  in  order  to  lighten 
the  burden  of  his  government.  But  in  drawing  such  an  infer- 
ence, we  proceed  on  ideas  derived  from  human  weakness.  The 
ingenious  workman  constructs  a  machine,  and  then  leaves  it  to 
itself ;  and  we  leap  to  the  conclusion  that  God,  after  having  cre- 
ated and  adjusted  the  world,  just  left  it  to  its  own  operations.  But 


CONNECTION    OF    GOD    WITH    HIS    WORKS.  153 

the  two  cases,  including  both  the  parties  employed  and  the  circum- 
stances, are  essentially  different.  The  human  workman,  let  it  be 
observed,  forms  no  laws  or  properties  of  matter — his  whole  object 
is  to  accommodate  his  materials  to  the  existing  laws  of  nature 
which  now  accomplish  his  purposes.  He  has  discovered  that  cer- 
tain agents  of  nature,  or  as  we  would  rather  express  it,  certain 
agents  of  God,  will  serve  his  ends  ;  he  skilfully  takes  advantage 
of  them,  and  his  work  is  completed.  But  in  this  he  is  merely  act- 
ing as  the  traveller  or  the  merchant,  who  uses  a  particular  con- 
veyance for  the  transmission  of  his  person  or  his  goods,  and 
thereby,  no  doubt,  lessens  his  own  toil,  but  not  the  total  amount 
of  labor  needful  for  the  end  effected. 

But  the  connection  of  God  with  these  laws  of  his  own  appoint- 
ment is  altogether  different  from  man's  relation  to  them.  Through 
the  bountiful  arrangements  of  God  man  can  lessen  his  toil,  and 
leave  his  works  to  nature  and  to  God  to  conduct  them  ;  but  it  does 
not,  therefore,  follow  that  God  can,  or  that  he  does  commit  his 
works  to  themselves.  Speaking  correctly  and  philosophically,  the 
general  laws  of  nature  are  just  rules  which  God  has  laid  down 
for  the  regulations  of  his  own  procedure.  Not  that  God,  as  a 
Being  omnipresent  and  omnipotent,  ever  watchful  and  ever  active, 
needs  those  helps  which  man  requires  in  consequence  of  his  infir- 
mities. The  Almighty  can  never  be  weighed  down  under  the 
burden  of  his  government.  He  adopts  the  mode  of  procedure  by 
general  laws,  not  for  his  own  convenience,  but  for  that  of  his  in- 
telligent creatures. 

It  is  not  difficult  to  discover  the  utility  of  this  method  of  action. 
It  is  the  regularity  of  the  laws  of  nature  which  leads  us  to  put 
confidence  in  them,  and  enables  us  to  use  them.  Without  such 
order  and  uniformity  man  would  have  no  motive  to  industry,  or 
incentive  to  activity.  Disposed  to  action,  he  would  ever  find  ac- 
tion to  be  useless,  for  he  could  not  find  out  the  tendency,  and 
much  less  the  exact  effect  of  any  step  which  he  might  take,  or 
course  of  action  adopted.  Suppose  that,  instead  of  rising  regu- 
larly at  a  known  time,  the  sun  were  to  appear  and  disappear  like 
a  meteor,  no  one  being  able  to  say  where,  or  when,  or  how,  all 
human  exertion  would  cease  in  a  feeling  of  utter  hopelessness. 
If,  instead  of  returning  in  a  regular  manner,  the  seasons  were  to 
follow  each  other  capriciously,  so  that  spring  might  be  immedi- 
ately succeeded  by  winter,  and  summer  preceded  by  autumn,  then 
the  labor  of  the  husbandman  would  be  at  an  end,  and  the  humaii 


154  CONNECTION    OF    GOD   WITH    HIS    WORKS. 

race  would  perish  from  the  earth.  In  such  a  state  of  things  man- 
kind would  not  have  sufficient  motive  to  do  such  common  acts  as 
to  partake  of  food,  for  they  could  not  anticipate  that  food  might 
support  them.  If  such  a  system,  or  rather  want  of  system,  per- 
vaded the  world,  suspicion  and  alarm  would  reign  in  every  breast ; 
man  would  sink  into  indolence,  with  all  the  accompanying  evils 
of  reckless  audacity  and  vice;  "fears  would  be  in  the  way,"  and 
man  would  dread  the  approach  of  danger  from  every  quarter,  and 
feel  himself  confused  as  in  a  dream,  or  lost  as  in  darkness,  or 
rather,  after  leading  a  brief  and  troubled  existence,  he  would  van- 
ish altogether  from  the  earth.  "  Now,  if  nature,"  says  Hooker, 
in  a  passage  which  we  quote  for  its  masculine  old  English,  as  well 
as  the  correctness  of  its  sentiment,*  "  should  intermit  her  course 
and  leave  altogether,  though  it  were  but  for  a  while,  the  observa- 
tion of  her  own  laws — if  those  principal  and  mother  elements, 
whereof  all  things  in  this  lower  world  are  made,  should  lose  the 
qualities  which  they  now  have — if  the  frame  of  that  heavenly 
arch  erected  over  our  heads  should  Jose  and  dissolve  itself — if  ce- 
lestial spheres  should  forget  their  wonted  motions,  and  by  irregu- 
lar volubility,  turn  themselves  any  way  it  might  happen — if  the 
prince  of  the  lights  of  heaven,  which  now  as  a  giant  doth  run  his 
unwearied  course,  should,  as  it  were,  through  a  languishing  faint- 
ness,  begin  to  stand  and  to  rest  himself — if  the  moon  should  wan- 
der from  her  beaten  way — the  times  and  seasons  blend  themselves 
by  disordered  and  confused  mixture,  the  winds  breathe  out  their 
last  gasp,  the  fcouds  yield  no  rain,  the  earth  be  defeated  of  heav- 
enly influence,  the  fruits  of  the  earth  pine  away  as  children  at  the 
withered  breast  of  their  mother,  no  longer  able  to  yield  them 
relief — what  would  become  of  man  himself,  whom  these  things 
do  now  all  serve?" 

How  unreasonably  then,  as  well  as  ungratefully,  do  those  act 
who  fail  to  discover  the  presence  of  God  in  his  works,  and  that 
because  of  the  existence  of  these  laws  so  beautiful  in  themselves, 
and  benignant  in  their  aspect  towards  us.  Every  person  sees  that 
the  blessings  which  God  lavished  upon  the  Hebrews,  in  that  desert 
which  now  supports  but  four  thousand  of  a  population,  but  was 
made  to  support  upwards  of  two  millions  and  a  half  for  a  period 
of  forty  years — every  one  sees  that  the  gifts  were  not  the  less,  but 
all  the  more  the  gifts  of  God,  from  the  circumstance  that  they  were 
bestowed  in  a  somewhat  regular  manner.  No  one  will  affirm  that 

*  Eccles.  Polity,  B.  i 


CONNECTION   OF     ftOD    WITH    HIS    WORKS.  155 

the  manna  was  the  less  bountiful  proof  of  the  care  of  God,  be- 
cause, in  order  to  suit  the  convenience  of  the  Israelites,  it  did  not 
fall  irregularly  but  at  periodical  intervals,  and  was  gathered  every 
morning,  that  those  who  partook  of  it  might  be  strengthened  for 
the  journey  of  the  day.  And  will  any  one  maintain  that  our 
daily  food  is  less  the  gift  of  God  because  it  is  not  sent  at  random, 
but  in  appointed  ways  and  at  certain  seasons,  that  we  may  be 
prepared  to  receive  it  ?  Was  the  water  of  which  the  Israelites 
drank  less  beneficent  because  it  followed  them  all  the  way  through 
the  wilderness?  No  one  will  affirm  that  it  was;  and  yet  there 
are  persons  who  feel  as  if  they  did  not  require  to  be  grateful  for 
the  water  of  which  they  drink,  because  it  comes  to  them  from  the 
clouds  of  heaven,  and  the  fountains  which  gush  from  the  earth. 

We  condemn  the  Hebrews  when  we  read  of  their  ingratitude, 
and  yet  we  imitate  their  conduct.  When  the  manna  first  fell,  and 
they  saw  abundance  of  food  on  the  bare  face  of  the  desert,  grati- 
tude heaved  in  every  breast,  and  the  bounty  of  God  was  acknowl- 
edged by  all.  How  short  a  time  elapsed  till  this  gratitude  was 
turned  into  apathy  and  indifference ;  and  they  began  to  look  upon 
the  manna  in  much  the  same  light  as  we  look  upon  the  dews  of 
the  evening,  or  the  crops  in  harvest,  as  something  regular  and  cus- 
tomary, the  denial  of  which  might  justify  complaint,  but  the  be- 
stowal of  which  was  not  reckoned  as  fitted  to  call  forth  thankful- 
ness. Because  the  water  flowed  with  them  through  all  their 
journey,  so  that  the  heat  of  a  burning  sun  could  not  exhale  it,  nor 
the  thirsting  sand  of  the  desert  drink  it  up,  just  because  it  con- 
tinued all  the  time  as  fresh  and  as  cool  as  when  it  leapt  from  its 
parent  rock,  the  Israelites  came  to  regard  it  with  as  little  wonder 
as  we  do  the  stream  which  may  run  past  our  dwelling.  The  pillar 
of  cloud  hung  continually  before  them,  so  that  the  rays  of  a 
meridian  sun  could  not  dissipate  it,  nor  the  winds  of  heaven  drive 
it  away ;  and  they  came  at  last  to  be  no  more  grateful  for  it  than 
we  usually  are  for  the  light  of  the  sun  returning  every  morning. 
Just  because  this  pillar  of  cloud  was  kindled  into  a  pillar  of  fire 
every  night,  they  became  as  familiar  with  it  as  we  are  with  the 
stars  which  God  lights  up  in  the  firmament.  The  younger  portion 
of  the  people,  born  in  the  desert,  and  long  accustomed  to  these 
wonders,  may  have  come  to  look  upon  them  as  altogether  natural, 
and  would  no  more  be  surprised  at  the  sight  of  the  fiery  pillar 
casting  its  lurid  glare  upon  the  sands,  than  we  are  with  the  meteor 
that  flashes  across  the  evening  sky.  Does  it  not  appear  as  if  it  were 


156  CONNECTION    OP    GOD    WITH    HIS    WORKS. 

the  very  frequency  of  the  gift,  and  the  regularity  of  its  coming, 
which  lead  mankind  to  forget  the  Giver  ?  It  is  as  if  a  gift  were 
left  every  morning  at  our  door,  and  we  were  at  length  to  imagine 
that  it  came  alone  without  being  sent.  It  is  as  if  the  widow, 
whose  barrel  of  meal  and  cruse  of  oil  were  blessed  by  the  prophet, 
had  come  at  length  to  imagine  that  there  was  nothing  supernatu- 
ral in  the  transaction,  just  because  the  barrel  of  meal  did  not 
waste,  and  the  cruse  of  oil  did  not  fail. 

In  order  to  prove  that  God  is  closely  and  intimately  connected 
with  his  works  in  nature,  it  is  not  needful  to  determine  what  is 
his  precise  causal  connection  with  events  which  have  also  second 
causes  in  the  heaven-endowed  properties  of  created  substances. 
Does  God  co-exist  and  co-operate  with  every  natural  cause,  the 
two  being  united  to  form  one  cause  ?  Or  do  the  natural  antece- 
dents themselves  form  the  whole  cause,  being  linked  to  the  will 
of  God,  only  so  far  as  they  are  the  distant  effect  of  that  will,  as 
the  first  great  cause  and  antecedent  of  all  things  1  So  far  from 
being  inclined  to  answer  these  questions  in  a  dogmatic  way,  we 
are  not  even  convinced  that  these  two  exhaust  the  possible  meth- 
ods which  God  may  employ  in  the  conducting  of  his  works,  or 
whether  there  may  not  be  a  third  or  a  fourth  way  all  practicable 
to  God,  and  that  whether  conceivable  or  inconceivable  by  man. 

It  has  often  been  asserted  that  we  have  no  evidence  of  God 
being  connected  with  his  works  in  any  other  way  than  his  being 
the  first  cause  of  all  things,  the  support  on  which  the  highest  link 
in  the  chain  of  inferior  causes  hangs.  We  have  only  to  consider 
what  is  the  nature  of  the  argument,  in  behalf  of  the  existence  of 
God,  to  discover  that  this  assertion  has  no  foundation  to  rest  on. 
That  argument  has  sometimes  been  stated  as  follows, — every 
event  has  a  cause,  and  in  tracing  up  causes  we  must  stop  at  length 
at  a  great  first  cause.  So  far  as  the  argument  assumes  this  form, 
the  assertion  which  we  are  examining  may  seem  to  have  some 
plausibility.  But  this  is  not  the  form  in  which  the  argument  is 
put  by  its  most  judicious  defenders.  The  better  form  is — there  are 
traces  of  design  in  nature  evidential  of  a  designing  mind.  And 
observe  how  this  argument  does  not  limit  us  to  the  conception  of 
God  as  a  first  link,  but  rather  inclines  us  to  look  for  the  presence 
of  the  designing  mind  wherever  there  are  traces  of  design,  and 
that  is  everywhere  throughout  the  works  of  nature. 

There  is  a  view  prevalent  among  the  votaries  of  physical  science 
as  to  the  connection  of  God  with  his  works,  which  seems  to  us  to 


CONNECTION    OF    GOD    WITH    HIS    WORKS.  167 

be  meagre  and  unsatisfactory  in  the  extreme.  It  is  conceived  that, 
at  some  distant  period  in  eternity  which  cannot  be  defined,  the 
Deity,  by  a  single  act  of  his  will,  caused  the  whole  universe  to 
start  forth  into  existence  ;  that  he  impressed  every  substance  which 
he  created,  with  its  several  self-acting  properties;  and  that  he 
himself  has  continued,  ever  since,  an  inactive  spectator.  This 
view  has  always  seemed  to  us,  if  not  positively  erroneous,  at  least 
lamentably  defective.  It  forgets  a  great  many  more  truths  than 
it  remembers.  It  forgets  that  the  omnipresent  God  is  present 
among  all  his  works,  that  the  omniscient  God  knoweth  all  that  is 
done,  that  the  all-benevolent  God  feels  an  interest  in  the  welfare 
of  all  his  creatures,  at  all  places  and  at  all  times,  and  that  the 
holy  Governor  of  the  universe  is  ever  watching  over  all  their 
actions.  If  these  other  truths  be  added,  we  do  not  feel  such  a  re- 
pugnance to  the  theory,  because  that  theory  comes  now  to  be 
different  in  its  nature,  and  different  in  its  practical  impression 
upon  the  mind,  and  is  totally  opposed  to  the  loose  creed  of  the 
ancient  Epicureans  and  modern  infidels.  When  we  take  these 
farther  truths  into  account,  they  serve  not  only  morally  to  counter- 
act the  evil  tendency  of  the  view  which  we  regard  as  so  bare  and 
heartless,  but  also  to  induce  us  to  doubt  whether  the  theory  is  not 
altogether  without  foundation.  For  if  God  is  present  in  all  his 
works,  and  interested  in  them,  is  it  reasonable  to  suppose  that  he 
is  inactive  in  the  midst  of  them  ?  Are  all  his  other  perfections  to 
be  exercised,  and  his  omnipotence  to  have  no  room  for  exertion  ? 
As  far  as  we  can  reason,  on  a  theme  which  is  so  transcendental  in 
its  nature,  it  seems  highly  improbable  that  God  should  have  so 
constituted  everything  as  to  leave  no  room  for  his  own  continued 
action.  As  he  fills  universal  space,  and  can  never  cease  to  love 
his  own  work,  and  feel  an  interest  in  it,  it  is  reasonable  to  think 
that  he  pervades  the  universe  as  an  active  agent.  It  may, be 
difficult  to  determine  the  precise  nature  of  his  action  ;  but,  with  no 
experience  of  a  world  without  an  indwelling  God,  we  are  inclined 
to  regard  this  indwelling  in  the  actual  world  as  essential  to  its 
continued  existence  and  operation. 

There  is  another  view  which  is  commonly  supported  by  divines, 
and  in  particular  by  a  philosophic  divine,  whose  intellectual  and 
spiritual  clearness  of  perception  in  theological  subjects  appears  to 
us  to  approach  nearer  the  angelic  than  has  been  the  attainment 
of  any  other  in  these  latter  days.  Jonathan  Edwards,  to  whom 
we  refer,  illustrates  the  manner  in  which  God  upholds  the  universe 


158  CONNECTION   OP   GOD   WITH   HIS   WORJtS. 

by  the  way  in  which  an  image  is  upheld  in  a  mirror.  That  image 
is  maintained  by  a  continual  flow  of  rays  of  light,  each  succeeding 
pencil  of  which  does  not  differ  from  that  by  which  the  image  was 
at  first  produced.  He  conceives  that  the  universe  is,  in  every  part 
of  it,  supported  in  a  similar  way.  by  a  continual  succession  of  acts 
of  the  Divine  will,  and  these  not  differing  from  that  which  at 
first  caused  the  world  to  spring  into  existence.  Now,  it  may  be 
safely  said  of  this  theory  that  it  cannot  be  disproved.  No  one  will 
affirm  that  an  everywhere-present  and  an  almighty  God  could  not 
conduct  his  government  on  such,  a  plan.  Several  considerations 
may  be  urged  in  support  of  it.  If  God  had  not  seen  fit  to  proceed 
by  general  laws  in  the  government  of  the  world,  it  would  have 
been  acknowledged  that  every  separate  event  required  a  separate 
act  of  the  Divine  will.  And  why,  it  may  be  asked,  when  God 
sees  fit,  for  beneficent  reasons,  to  act  according  to  general  laws  in 
the  actual  world,  should  it  ever  be  supposed  that  such  Divine 
agency  is  not  equally  needed  ?  It  would  be  required  as  is  acknowl- 
edged in  an  irregular  system — and  why  should  it  not  be  held  as 
necessary  in  the  regular  mode  of  Divine  government  actually 
employed  ? 

But  if,  as  we  admit,  the  view  cannot  be  disproved,  it  may  be 
doubted  if  it  can  be  proved  by  conclusive  evidence.  The  human 
mind  is  discussing  subjects  beyond  its  capacity,  when  it  is  deter- 
mining the  precise  causal  connection  of  God  as  the  first  cause 
with  the  second  causes  which  he  hath  ordained.  Unsolved  and 
unsolvable  questions  present  themselves  when  we  push  our  in- 
quiries beyond  a  certain  limit.  How  does  he  inhabit  all  space  ?— 
how  does  he  inhabit  the  same  space  which  seems  to  be  filled  with 
matter? — what  is  the  precise  nature  of  the  Divine  volitions?— 
what,  in  particular,  is  the  nature  of  the  continual  acts  of  the  will 
by  which,  according  to  Edwards,  the  universe  is  sustained  in  every 
part  of  it  ?  These  inquiries  carry  us  into  depths  into  which  the 
schoolmen  would  have  rushed  with  eagerness  to  sink  or  swim  to 
no  purpose,  but  which  we  have  truly  no  sounding-lines  to  fathom. 

We  are  satisfied  if  the  old  Epicurean  view  of  Deity,  inactive 
and  unconcerned,  be  discarded,  and  if  it  be  acknowledged  that 
God  is  ever  active,  and  ever  benevolent  in  his  activity ;  ever  benev- 
olent, and  active  in  his  benevolence  ;  and,  in  all  places  and  at  all 
times,  the  guardian  and  governor  of  all  his  creatures,  and  the 
judge  of  all  their  actions. 


INFINITE    POWER    AND    WISDOM    REQUIRED,    ETC.  159 


SECTION  VI— INFINITE  POWER  AND  WISDOM  REQUIRED  TO  GOVERN 
A  WORLD  SO  CONSTITUTED. 

There  is  wisdom  displayed,  we  have  seen,  in  the  circumstance, 
that  the  world  is  governed  by  general  laws,  and  in  the  relation 
of  the  various  substances  and  laws  towards  each  other.  But  the 
plan,  as  it  is  devised  by  Divine  wisdom,  so  it  requires  Divine 
wisdom  to  execute  it.  The  infinite  mind  that  conceived  it,  and  it 
alone,  can  wield  it.  One  trembles  at  the  very  idea  of  the  execu- 
tion of  such  a  scheme  being  committed  to  any  other  than  a  being 
whose  intelligence  and  resources  are  unbounded. 

Yet  we  may  for  an  instant  imagine  a  world  so  constituted  being 
committed  to  the  government  of  a  being  high  and  exalted,  but  yet 
finite,  to  one  of  the  younger  gods  of  heathen  fable,  or  of  the 
angels  of  revelation.  And  when  things  were  first  set  in  motion, 
it  might  look  as  if  all  was  harmoniously  planned,  and  as  if  every 
emergency  had  been  provided  for.  Planet  upon  planet,  and  sun 
upon  sun,  spring  into  being,  and  are  peopled  by  innumerable  living 
creatures,  with  inanimate  objects  suited  to  their  nature  and  charac- 
ter. For  a  time,  the  laws  move  on  with  beautiful  regularity ;  but 
suddenly,  and  at  some  distant  point,  events  come  into  unexpected 
contact,  and  then  into  violent  collision,  and  results  follow  which 
even  an  archangel's  foresight  could  not  have  anticipated.  Evil  is 
now  threatened  at  points  where  there  is  nothing  to  meet  it.  Laws, 
beautiful  in  themselves,  are  crossed,  accelerated,  or  interrupted  by 
other  laws  ;  and  consequences  follow  which  the  supposed  governor 
of  the  universe  cannot  contemplate  without  horror.  Thousands 
of  living  beings,  in  certain  parts  of  the  world,  are  left  neglected ; 
or  are  placed  in  terrific  circumstances,  owing  to  some  omission  or 
oversight.  Disorder  meanwhile  propagates  itself  in  widening  cir- 
cles ;  and  beginning  in  a  corner  which  had  been  overlooked,  it 
soon  spreads  like  a  wasting  disease  to  other  districts,  or  to  other 
worlds.  The  very  compactness  of  the  connection  in  which  all 
things  are  bound,  serves  only  to  extend  the  prevailing  confusion 
and  misery.  If  the  various  parts  of  the  world  had  not  been  so 
linked  together,  the  evil  might  have  died  and  disappeared  at  the 
place  where  it  began  its  ravages.  But  human  beings  were  never 
so  crowded  together  in  a  city,  where  plague  has  broken  out  in 
fearful  virulence,  as  the  objects  of  this  world  are  concatenated 
by  their  various  relations ;  and  plague  spreading  itself  through 
that  city  till  every  district  was  infectedj  is  a  picture  on  a  smalJ 


160  INFINITE    POWER    AND    WISDOM    REQUIRED   TO 

scale  of  the  manner  in  which  evil  once  breaking  out  would  propa- 
gate itself  from  one  country  and  one  world  to  another.  The  in- 
telligent creation,  as  they  surveyed  the  advancing  disorder,  would 
be  confounded  and  dismayed ;  and  we  can  conceive,  that  the 
governor  of  the  world  would  at  last  feel  himself  terror-struck  in 
the  survey  of  his  own  impotency. 

But  why  should  he  not  interfere,  it  may  be  said,  to  prevent  the 
evil  ?  The  answer  is,  that  according  to  the  principles  which  we 
have  been  developing,  every  such  interference  would  be  an  evil, 
so  far,  at  least,  as  it  proceeded  from  weakness.  For  the  intelli- 
gent creatures  gather  their  experience  from  a  state  of  things  in 
which  all  events  proceed  by  general  laws ;  and  so  far  as  these 
laws  were  interfered  with  or  suspended,  they  would  find  their 
experience  avail  them  nothing,  or  positively  misleading  them ; 
and  confusion  would  spread  itself,  not  merely  in  the  physical  uni- 
verse, but  among  all  its  now  amazed  and  awe-struck  population. 
The  world,  in  short,  would  reach  the  state  in  which  we  have  seen 
a  powerful  machine — a  steam-engine,  for  instance — with  a  part 
of  it  broken,  or  out  of  joint,  moving  on  more  rapidly  than  ever, 
but  now  with  an  all-destructive  energy.  The  only  resource  of 
the  governor  of  the  engine,  in  the  case  supposed,  is  to  stop  it  as 
soon  as  possible ;  and  we  believe  that  a  finite  creature  governing 
this  world  would  soon  feel  himself  in  a  similar  condition,  and  find 
it  to  be  his  wisest  and  most  benevolent  course  to  abolish,  as 
speedily  as  possible,  the  world  which  he  was  so  misgoverning. 

How  difficult  (humanly  speaking)  to  make  every  one  arrange- 
ment of  a  universe  so  complicated,  and  yet  so  connected,  to  har- 
monize with  every  other.  It  is  reckoned  a  proof  of  the  highest 
genius  in  general,  to  be  able  to  make  skilful  combinations.  The 
mere  discipline  of  each  particular  regiment,  however  orderly 
— or  the  courage  of  the  troops,  however  great — will  not  avail,  un- 
less the  commander  can  marshal  and  dispose  the  forces  under  his 
command.  The  very  size  of  an  army  under  an  unskilful  captain, 
may  only  be  the  means  of  rendering  it  more  unwieldy,  and  secur- 
ing its  speedier  defeat.  The  general  is  showing  his  highest  quali- 
ties when  he  can  bring  all  his  troops  into  action  at  the  most 
befitting  moment,  and  cause  them  all,  without  any  loss  of  force, 
to  bear  directly  or  indirectly  on  the  object  in  view.  Every  reflect- 
ing mind  will  acknowledge,  that  in  like  manner  the  wisdom  of 
God  is  peculiarly  seen  in  those  skilful  arrangements  of  the  uni- 


GOVERN    A    WORLD    SO    CONSTITUTED.  161 

verse  by  which  no  part  is  useless,  and  every  part  conspires  to  the 
accomplishment  of  the  end  intended. 

We  live,  it  is  manifest,  in  the  midst  of  a  system,  every  one  part 
of  which  is  adapted  with  the  greatest  nicety  to  every  other.  We 
see  before  us  what  we  reckoned  a  useless  plant ;  and  we  conclude 
that  the  species  might  be  eradicated,  and  no  evil  follow.  But  the 
conclusion  is  rash.  For  the  seed  of  that  plant  may  be  needful  to 
the  support  of  some  kind  of  bird,  or  the  root  of  it  for  some  insect ; 
and  that  bird  or  insect  may  serve  an  important  purpose  in  the  dis- 
pensation of  providence;  and  were  we  completely  to  root  out  that 
plant  bearing  seed  after  its  kind,  we  might  throw  the  whole  econ- 
omy of  the  earth  into  inextricable  cou fusion.  / 

Such  considerations  as  these  should  convince  us,  that  there  is 
as  much  wisdom  required  to  govern  the  world  as  to  devise  the 
method  of  its  government.  What  wise  combinations,  for  instance, 
are  needed  in  order  that  the  wants  of  every  living  creature  may 
be  supplied  in  the  proper  time  and  way  !  What  skill  does  it  re- 
quire to  provide  food  for  an  army  marching  through  a  hostile 
country  !  The  way  in  which  the  pommissariat  was  managed  by 
our  greatest  living  general,  has  always  been  reckoned  one  of  the 
most  striking  evidences  of  his  military  skill.  Yet  every  one  sees, 
that  in  the  way  of  aiding  our  limited  faculties,  we  are  comparing 
small  things  to  things  infinitely  great  and  beyond  human  com- 
prehension, in  illustrating,  by  means  of  the  work  of  providing  the 
necessaries  of  life  for  an  army,  the  task  which  can  be  undertaken 
only  by  the  Almighty,  of  providing  for  the  wants  of  the  myriads 
of  his  creatures.  Omniscience  is  required  to  the  planning  of  such 
a  system,  and  omnipotence  and  omnipresence  to  its  execution. 
The  end  must  be  seen  from  the  beginning,  and  the  result  of  every 
law  and  combination  of  laws  foreknown  and  anticipated ;  and 
there  must  be  a  living  agent  pervading  and  giving  life  to  his 
works  in  every  part  of  his  dominions.  When  we  know  that^here 
is  such  a  being,  we  feel  as  if  all  were  safe  and  secure ;  for  we 
know  that  nothing  can  occur  unseen  and  unforeseen,  and  that 
there  can  be  no  derangement  in  works  which  are  protected  by  an 
everywhere  present  and  ever  watchful  guardian.  Such  faith  will 
impart  a  holy  courage  even  to  the  most  timid  ;  and  we  feel  as  if 
we  might  be  unalarmed  amid  the  conflagrations  of  worlds,  and 
while  the  visible  universe  is  passing  away. 

11 


162  UNITY   OF   THE    COSMOS, 

SECTION  VII.— UNITY  OF  THE  MUNDANE  SYSTEM. 

We  may  distinguish  between  the  universe  (TO  6lot>)  and  the 
part  of  the  universe  with  which  we  are  connected,  and  which  we 
may  call  the  Cosmos,  including  all  that  system  of  which  the 
earth  and  visible  heavens  are  a  portion. 

Astronomers  are  inclined  to  boast  that  they  give  us  a  very  en- 
larged view  of  the  universe,  when  they  tell  us  of  the  myriads  of 
stars  and  of  the  systems  of  stars  which  fall  within  the  range  of 
the  telescope.  Now,  it  has  always. appeared  to  us,  that  this  whole 
system  of  suns  may  not  bear  so  great  a  relation  to  the  whole 
universe,  as  a  single  apple  tree,  or  a  single  apple,  to  a  whole 
orchard  loaded  with  divers  fruits,  or  the  whole  trees  that  are  to  be 
found  on  the  earth  ;  or  as  a  single  leaf  bears  to  a  whole  forest,  or  to 
the  whole  natural  products  of  our  globe.  Beyond  the  sidereal 
heavens,  there  may  be  systems  differing  from  these  clusters  of 
stars,  or  differing  from  our  system,  as  much  as  the  plant  differs 
from  the  stone,  or  the  animal  from  the  plant,  or  the  body  from  the 
mind.  "  When  nature,"  says  Hume,  "  has  so  entirely  diversified 
her  manner  of  operation  in  this  small  globe,  can  we  imagine  she 
incessantly  copies  herself  throughout  so  immense  a  universe?"* 
That  law  of  gravitation  which  astronomers  all  but  deify,  may 
turn  out  after  all  to  regulate  but  a  comparatively  small  portion 
of  the  bodies  that  people  universal  space.  There  may  be  my- 
riads of  other  systems  as  grand  and  as  glorious  as  ours,  regu- 
lated by  other  laws  equally  beautiful ;  and  manifesting,  by  their 
variety,  the  infinite  riches  of  the  wisdom,  power,  and  goodness  of 
God. 

Humboldt  and  the  geologists  would  enlarge  our  conceptions  of 
Time  by  developing  the  progressive  epochs  of  the  earth's  history. 
But  we  would  be  inclined  to  extend  our  conceptions  into  eternity, 
beyond  even  the  numbered  years  of  the  geologic  eras.  There 
may  have  been  other  epochs  which  had  come  to  a  close  before 
the  history  of  our  Cosmos  began. 

But  however  this  may  be,  it  seems  as  if,  within  limited  space 
and  time,  there  is  a  distinct  compartment  of  God's  works,  which 
we  call  the  Cosmos.  This  compartment,  no  doubt,  has  points 
of  junction  with  other  compartments,  but  it  may  itself  be  sep- 
arate ;  and  it  seems  as  if  within  this  compartment  there  is  a 
system  of  uniform  laws.  The  mountains  in  the  moon — the  ap- 
*  Dial,  on  Nat  ReL  p.  2. 


UNITY  OP    THE   COSMOS.  163 

parent  sea  and  land  in  Mars — and  the  aerolites  that  form  the 
heavens — the  circumstance  that  our  sun  is  a  star  in  a  particular 
galaxy,  said  to  be  hastening  towards  a  point  in  the  constellation 
Hercules ;  and  that  there  are  other  and  similar  galaxies,  all  seem 
to  indicate  a  homogeneity  in  the  bodies  which  are  to  be  found  in 
'knowable  space.  The  connection  of  the  present  state  of  the 
earth,  with  the  previous  changes  on  the  earth's  surface,  and  the 
traces  in  former  epochs  of  the  laws  that  are  still  in  operation, 
show  that  there  has  been  a  uniformity  in  all  knowable  t'ime. 

Now,  the  considerations  urged  in  the  text  show  why  it  is  that 
there  is  a  system  of  general  laws  :  It  is  for  the  good  of  the  intel- 
ligent creatures,  who  attain  knowledge  by  induction.  But  as  this 
system  of  laws  reaches  through  the  whole  Cosmos,  geological  and 
astronomical,  does  it  not  seem  as  if,  throughout  its  unmeasured 
ages  and  space,  there  might  be  beings  homogeneous  so  far  to  man 
as  our  earth  and  sun  seem  to  be  homogeneous  to  other  suns  and 
planets,  and  so  far  resembling  them,  that  they  gather  knowledge 
from  experience,  proceeding  upon  invariable  general  laws  observed 
by  them  ?  Are  there  creatures  a  little  higher  than  man,  who  have 
existed  through  all  known  time,  and  who  ramble  at  pleasure 
through  all  known  space,  gathering  their  ever  increasing  knowl- 
edge from  the  uniform  laws  of  God  ?  To  these  questions,  nature 
gives  no  very  audible  answer  ;  though  we  have  sometimes  felt  as 
if  we  heard  it  utter  certain  indistinct  whispers,  as  we  looked  into 
the  depths  adorned  by  these  rolling  stars,  and  varied  by  these 
rolling  epochs.  We  have  at  least  listened  so  long  to  the  silence 
of  nature,  as  to  prepare  us  for  listening  with  gratitude  to  the  dis- 
tinct voice  of  revelation,  when  it  announces  the  existence  of  angels, 
fallen  and  unfallen.  Connecting  the  physical  facts  with  the  super- 
natural intelligence,  we  feel  as  if  we  had  got,  on  the  one  hand,  a 
final  cause  for  the  uniformity  of  general  laws,  through  unnum- 
bered ages  and  unmeasured  space ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  were 
the  better  enabled  to  entertain  an  exalted  idea  of  those  spiritual 
beings  who  excel  in  strength,  and  to  understand  how,  in  their 
unseen  excursions,  they  should  behold  and  feel  the  deepest  inter- 
est in  man,  who  is  closely  allied  to  them,  for  he  was  made  a  little 
lower  than  the  angels. 

The  microscope  has  shown  how  the  earth,  air,  and  water  are 
crowded  with  sentient  being,  enjoying  and  propagating  happiness. 
Revelation,  and  the  highest  philosophy,  seem  to  combine  their 
light,  to  show  how  all  time  has  been  peopled,  and  how  all  space  is 


164  UNITY   OP   THE    COSMOS. 

inhabited,  by  spiritual  intelligences.  We  live  in  the  midst  of  a 
world  that  we  see ;  but  we  live  also  in  the  midst  of  a  world  that 
we  do  not  see.  With  that  invisible  world,  the  spiritual  as  well  as 
the  sentient,  we  may  have  numerous  relations  and  points  of  con- 
nection— we  with  them,  and  they  with  us,  as  parts  of  one  great 
and  connected  system,  embracing  that  portion  of  eternity  and  in- 
finity which  we  call  time  and  space. 

Modern  science,  and  more  particularly  the  observations  made  by 
the  telescope,  and  the  recent  disclosures  of  long  geological  epochs,, 
have  widened  on  every  side,  above -and  below,  behind  and  beforer 
man's  idea  of  the  universe ;  and  man  is  magnified  in  the  magni- 
fying of  his  conceptions.  But  by  so  much  as  the  mental  exceeds 
the  material,  and  the  spiritual  the  sensible,  do  the  discoveries  of 
Divine  revelation  transcend  all  the  discoveries  of  natural  science, 
when  the  former  discloses  ten  thousand  times  ten  thousand  and 
thousands  of  thousands  of  angels  and  ministering  spirits.  The 
one  class  of  discoveries  tends  to  enlarge  our  conception  of  the  uni- 
verse more  than  even  the  other;  and  if  the  mind  is  enlarged  in 
the  enlarged  contemplation  of  the  physical,  how  much  more  must 
it  be  elevated  by  the  contemplation  of  the  moral  and  the  spiritual? 
And  is  there  no  point  at  which  the  two  sets  of  discoveries  meet ! 

In  our  own  frame,  we  see  the  intimate  connection  between  the 
mental  and  the  material.  Around  us  we  see  the  relation  of  har- 
monious nature  to  living  intelligence.  There  are  high  points  in 
all  inquiry  and  speculation,  at  which  the  sensible  seems  to  land 
us  in  the  supra-sensible.  There  are  places  at  which  natural  sci- 
ence seems  to  meet  with  revealed  religion, — and  as  they  meet,  to 
speak  of  intelligences  higher  than  man  and  higher  than  nature  j 
but  who  may  exercise  an  influence  on  man,  and  move  in  nature 
in  accordance  with  its  laws,  which  are  adjusted  for  them  as  for 
us  ;  for  them,  so  as  not  to  interfere  with  us — and  for  us,  so  as  not 
to  interfere  with  them.  We  argue  from  the  greatness  of  God's 
power  and  benevolence,  that  the  heavenly  bodies  must  be  peopled 
with  sentient  being ;  and  if  each  sun  and  planet  has  its  isolated 
inhabitants,  why  in  the  profusion  of  God's  resources  and  love  may 
there  not  be  common  visitants  of  all  the  suns  and  all  the  planets, 
connecting  them  together  by  stronger  ties  than  all  their  physical 
bonds  ?  But  these  points  lie  on  the  very  horizon  of  man's  vision  ; 
and  he  can  but  conjecture  what  may  be,  without  dogmatically  af- 
firming that  he  has  discovered  what  actually  is. 

There  are  narrow  minds  which  can  never  take  in  more  than 


UNITY    OF    THE    COSMOS.  165 

truth.  Because  natural  law  universally  prevails,  they  would 
exclude  everything  but  natural  law.  But  though  we  seem  to  be 
able  to  trace  the  operation  of  continuous  natural  agents  through 
ages  of  indefinite  number,  and  regions  of  indefinite  extent,  we  are 
not  therefore  to  limit  the  power  of  the  Omnipotent,  and  dogmati- 
cally affirm,  that  he  is  never  to  superinduce  upon  these  agencies 
an  immediate  operation  of  his  own  will  as  the  sole  cause  of  the 
physical  effects  produced  by  him.  On  this  subject,  we  should 
hold  ourselves  prepared  to  listen  to  that  authenticated  experience 
which  furnishes  the  only  evidence  in  favor  of  the  prevalence  of 
physical  law.  They  are  guilty  of  lamentable  inconsistency  who 
listen  to  experience  when  it  testifies  in  favor  of  the  continuity  of 
natural  law,  but  refuse  to  listen  to  that  same  evidence  when  it 
testifies  to  certain  distinguished  exceptions. 

There  is  no  fact  which  has  been  demonstrated  more  completely 
to  the  satisfaction  of  every  man  of  real  science,  than  that  there  is 
no  known  power  in  nature  capable  of  creating  a  new  species  of 
animal,  or  transmitting  one  species  of  animal  into  another.*  Yet 
geology  reveals,  as  among  the  most  certain  of  its  discoveries,  the 
introduction  of  new  species  of  living  creatures  at  various  periods 
in  the  history  of  the  ancient  earth.  Finding  no  cause  among 
natural  agents  fitted  to  produce  the  effect,  we  rise  to  the  only 
known  cause  capable  of  producing  it — the  fiat  of  the  Creator.  All 
who  acknowledge  the  creation  of  the  world  at  the  beginning, 
must  be  prepared  to  admit  the  possibility  of  subsequent  acts  of 
creation,  and  should  be  prepared  to  believe,  on  the  production  of 
sufficient  evidence,  that  there  actually  have  been  such  acts  of  cre- 
ation. A  widely-extended  and  uniform  experience  testifies  that 
physical  law  cannot  give  a  new  species  of  living  creature,  and 
shuts  us  up  to  the  recognition  of  the  Divine  agency  as  the  only 
power  capable  of  the  act. 

Will  any  one  venture  to  affirm  that  the  introduction  of  new  life 
may  not  be  an  occasion  worthy  of  the  direct  action  of  the  original 
creator,  or  an  act  beyond  the  capacity  of  any  power  inferior  to 
that  which  created  life  at  first?  Or  there  maybe  a  propriety 
when  new  life  is  introduced,  that  it  should  be  seen  by  the  intelli- 
gent creation  to  be  an  extraordinary  act.  The  seen  agency  of  the 
Creator  in  such  an  interposition  may  be  the  means  of  awakening 
the  attention  of  the  creatures  who  observe  his  works,  to  prepare 

*  See  Foot-prints  of  the  Creator,  by  Hugh  Miller,  a  work  distinguished  equally  by 
«ts  descriptive  and  ratiocinative  power. 


166  UNITY    OP   THE    COSMOS, 

for  the  working  of  the  new  physical  laws  introduced.  By  such 
acts,  the  Creator  may  show  that  he  is  still  to  be  recognised  as  a 
power  in  the  midst  of  other  powers  of  nature,  as  well  as  a  power 
above  them. 

If,  as  scientific  research  shows,  the  introduction  of  animal  life 
seems  to  call  for  the  energy  of  the  governor  of  the  universe  acting 
without  an  instrument,  we  should  thereby  be  the  better  prepared 
to  believe,  when  the  needful  evidence  is  produced,  that  there  may 
be  a  similar  exercise  and  display  of  power  in  the  introduction  of 
new  spiritual  life.  Such  grand  interferences  may  be  part  of  a 
system  or  law  co-extensive  with  the  histoiy  of  the  world  ;  and  the 
introduction  of  animal  life  in  the  ancient  animal  economies,  may 
have  a  corresponding  fact  in  the  interposition  of  deity  to  introduce 
spiritual  life  in  the  era  of  spiritual  intelligences.  The  exceptions 
may  form  a  rule  or  a  law  embraced  within  the  great  scheme  of 
Jaws,  and  constitute  an  essential  part  of  the  sublime  system  of  the 
world. 

In  all  such  cases  there  is  only  the  temporary  and  occasional 
superinduction  of  a  cause,  known  to  exist  and  to  be  capable  of  the 
acts,  though  not  usually  acting  after  that  particular  mode  of  ope- 
ration. And  when  that  cause  is  known,  and  acknowledged  to  be 
acting  after  an  extraordinary  manner,  no  evrl  can  possibly  arise 
from  it  in  misleading  the  intelligent  creation.  It  is  conceivable, 
on  the  contrary,  that  such  an  interposition  may  call  their  atten- 
tion to  the  agency  of  the  new  life  now  introduced  upon  the  scene. 
It  will  commonly  be  found,  in  regard  to  such  interpositions,  that 
they  are  only  occasional,  and  after  long  intervals  ;  that  the  mirac- 
ulous agency  is  displayed  only  on  the  introduction  of  a  new  dis- 
pensation, and  afterwards  gives  place  to  the  ordinary  operation  of 
law  ;  or  that  when  continued,  as  in  the  internal  regeneration  of 
fallen  humanity,  it  is  as  a  secret  principle  unseen  by  the  world. 
Such  exceptions,  when  known  to  be  exceptions,  and  seen  to  serve 
a  great  and  gracious  end,  rather  confirm  the  general  rule,  and  are 
in  no  way  inconsistent  with  the  continuous  prevalence  of  subor- 
dinate causes  in  the  ordinary  course  of  the  Divine  administration,. 


CHAPTER  II. 

THE  PROVIDENCE  OF  GOD. 

SECTION  L— ISOLATED  AND  FORTUITOUS  EVENTS  RESULTING  FROM 
THE  ADJUSTMENT  OF  MATERIAL  SUBSTANCES  TO  EACH  OTHER. 

ANOTHER  feature  of  the  Divine  Government  in  the  physical 
world  now  comes  to  be  investigated.  It  is,  in  our  view,  the  most 
wonderful  of  any,  and  peculiarly  characteristic  of  the  state  in 
which  the  human  race  are  placed.  Let  us  look  at  it  as  we  ap- 
proach it  by  degrees. 

God,  we  have  seen,  has  so  arranged  material  substances,  in  re- 
lation to  one  another  and  their  properties,  that  a  vast  number  of 
events  fall  out  according  to  certain  principles  of  order ;  and  there 
is,  in  consequence,  a  uniformity  in  the  whole  of  nature  disposing 
the  intelligent  creature  to  inquiry,  and  imparting  to  him  a  feeling 
of  confidence  and  a  sense  of  security.  Now,  it  is  conceivable  that 
God  might  have  so  constituted  this  world  that  these  general  laws 
or  principles  of  order  had  been  few,  and  free  from  all  complexity. 
There  might,  for  example,  have  only  been  a  few  such  laws  as 
those  of  universal  gravitation,  the  results  of  which  might  have 
been  calculated  easily  and  with  certainty.  All  future  events,  in 
such  a  constitution  of  things,  could  have  been  ascertained  and 
counted  on  as  confidently  as  the  position  of  the  planets,  or  the 
periodical  return  of  the  tides,  or  the  eclipses  of  the  sun  and  moon. 

But  while  there  might  have  been  much  in  such  a  system  that 
was  grand  and  majestic,  there  would  manifestly  have  been  a  reign- 
ing sameness  and  monotony.  There  had  been  no  field  for  the 
imagination  and  fancy  to  sport  in,  and  no  object  to  call  forth  feel- 
ings of  wonder  and  surprise.  The  future  and  the  past,  the 
heavens  above  and  the  earth  around  us,  had  been  as  an  uninter- 
esting plain  stretching  out  before  and  behind,  on  the  right. hand 
and  on  the  left,  without  a  height  on  which  the  eye  might  rest,  or 
inviting  us  to  ascend  that  from  its  top  we  might  behold  new  won- 


168  ISOLATED    EVENTS    AND    FORTUITIES. 

ders.  Man  had  not  been  able  to  lose  himself  in  a  delightful  mix- 
ture of  hill  and  valley,  of  light  and  shadow,  of  gloom  and  sunshine ; 
nor  to  employ  himself  in  unfolding  half-concealed  beauties,  and 
diving  into  every  opening  grandeur  and  magnificence.  "  Eleusis," 
says  Seneca,  "  reserves  something  for  the  second  visit  of  the  wor- 
shipper, so,  too,  nature  does  not  at  once  disclose  all  her  mysteries." 
But  in  such  a  scheme  as  that  now  referred .  to,  there  would  have 
been  little  room  for  the  discovery  of  developing  properties,  and  new 
combinations,  and  unexpected  scenes  bursting  on  the  view.  The 
objects  presented  in  nature  would  have  left  the  same  impression 
on  the  mind  as  the  Egyptian  architecture  and  sculpture,  as  the 
stupendous  pyramid  and  the  fixed  gaze  of  the  Sphinx,  by  one 
glance  at  which  you  see  all  that  you  ever  can  see.  We  would 
have  contemplated  these  laws  ever  recurring,  with  much  the  same 
feelings  as  we  look  on  a  few  gigantic  wheels  running  their  per- 
petual rounds  with  awful  and  irresistible  power,  and  wearying  the 
eye  that  would  gaze  upon  them.  As  soon  as  these  obvious  laws 
had  been  discovered  all  scientific  investigation  must  have  ceased, 
because  all  was  discovered  that  ever  could  be  discovered.  Every 
event  would  have  been  anticipated  before  it  happened ;  or  rather 
the  mind,  wearied  with  sameness,  would  have  ceased  to  anticipate 
the  future,  since  that  future  could  present  nothing  which  had  not 
been  seen  before.  Persons  naturally  of  the  most  ardent  curiosity, 
and  quickest  apprehension,  would,  in  such  a  state  of  things,  have 
hastened  to  give  themselves  up  to  that  abstraction  which  is  reck- 
oned so  meritorious  in  eastern  countries.  Now,  we  find  that  these 
evils  are  avoided,  and  nature  so  far  adapted  to  the  constitution  of 
man,  by  these  laws  being  very  numerous  and  diversified. 

But  this  is  not  exactly  the  property  of  the  Divine  government 
to  which  our  attention  is  now  called.  It  is  conceivable  that  the 
general  laws  of  nature  might  have  been  as  numerous  as  they  are, 
and  yet  have  been  arranged  so  simply  and  gracefully  that  they 
had  all  combined  to  produce  the  most  harmonious  results.  It  is 
after  this  manner  that  the  laws  of  nature  operate  in  the  heavens, 
furnishing  scenery  of  the  greatest  loveliness  and  of  surpassing 
grandeur.  But  the  government  of  this  earth  is,  in  this  respect, 
different  from  the  government  of  the  heavens,  so  far  at  least  as 
the  latter  comes  under  our  view.  In  the  former,  all  is  certainty 
and  order,  not  only  real,  but  apparent ;  in  the  latter,  when  viewed 
under  many  of  its  aspects,  there  appear  to  the  eye  of  man  only 
reigning  confusion  and  uncertainty. 


THE    PROVIDENCE    OP    GOD.  169 

We  have  seen  that  physical  nature  is  so  admirably  adjusted  as 
to  produce  a  number  of  very  beneficent  general  laws.  But  all  the 
results  that  follow  from  the  adjustment  of  natural  objects  are  not 
of  this  orderly  nature.  On  the  contrary,  a  vast  number  of  them 
are  of  an  individual  and  isolated  character.  Those  events  that 
happen  in  an  orderly  manner  may  be  anticipated,  and  pains  may 
be  taken  for  welcoming  them  if  they  are  supposed  to  be  good,  and 
of  avoiding*and  averting  them  if  they  are  regarded  as  evil.  But 
there  are  others  which  follow  no  such  regular  order.  They  are 
the  result  not  so  much  of  any  general  law  as  of  the  unexpected 
crossing  or  clashing,  contact  or  collision,  of  two  or  more  general 
laws.  Palling  out  incidentally,  they  cannot  possibly  be  foreseen 
by  the  greatest  human  sagacity,  and  the  good  which  they  bring 
cannot  be  secured  by  human  foresight,  nor  the  evil  which  they 
produce  be  warded  off  by  caution  or  vigilance. 

Not  that  we  are  to  regard  the  phenomena  now  referred  to  as 
happening  without  a  cause.  Both  classes  of  phenomena  proceed 
from  physical  causes,  but  the  one  from  causes  so  arranged  as  to 
produce  general  effects,  and  the  other  from  causes  so  disposed  as 
to  produce  an  individual  or  isolated  result.  The  general  law  of 
cause  and  effect  is, — that  the  same  cause  produces  the  same  effect 
in  the  same  circumstances.  Now,  in  the  case  of  the  events  that 
occur  according  to  general  law,  the  circumstances  continue  the 
same,  or  are  made  to  recur — and  hence  the  regularity  of  the 
effects.  In  the  case  of  the  other  events,  the  circumstances  change 
— and  hence  the  isolated  nature  of  the  effects.  The  same  combi- 
nations of  circumstances,  the  same  adjustment  of  things,  may 
never  recur  again,  and  so  as  to  produce  precisely  the  same  results. 

Hence  it  happens,  that  even  when  the  causes  are  ascertained, 
the  results,  owing  to  the  complicated  relation  of  the  substances 
and  laws  to  one  another,  cannot  be  determined  beforehand.  When 
we  cast  the  dice  into  the  box,  though  we  may  know  every  law  by 
which  their  motion  is  regulated,  yet  we  cannot  predict  the  die  that 
may  be  cast  up.  And  thus  it  may  happen,  that  in  departments 
of  nature  in  which  every  property  of  matter  in  operation  has  been 
discovered  by  science,  it  is  yet  absolutely  impossible,  owing  to  the 
way  in  which  the  laws  cross  each  other,  and  the  objects  are 
crowded  together,  for  the  shrewdest  sagacity  to  anticipate  the 
future.  We  know  many  of  the  causes  by  which  the  motion  of  the 
winds  is  determined,  but  no  man  can  tell  how  these  winds  may 
blow  at  any  given  time.  Though  we  knew  all  the  laws  of  mete- 


170  ISOLATED    EVENTS    AND    FORTUITIES. 

orology,  we  would  not  be  nearer  the  discovery  of  the  probable 
weather  at  any  particular  time  or  place.  We  thus  see  how  acci- 
dent may  abound  in  a  world  where  the  operation  of  cause  and 
effect  is  acknowledged  to  be  universal. 

There  is,  truly,  so  far  as  man  can  observe,  as  much  uncertainty, 
in  many  departments  of  God's  works,  as  if  there  were  no  laws 
which  they  obeyed.  Many  have,  in  consequence,  rashly  rushed 
to  the  conclusion  that  God  does  not  .rule  in  these  heavens,  or  that 
his  government  does  not  extend  to  the  earth.*  The  Romans  were 
not  singular  in  representing  Fortune  as  blind,  and  worshipping 
her  as  a  goddess  who  has  extensive  sway  over  the  destinies  of 
mankind. 

This  uncertainty  meeting  us  everywhere,  is  more  especially  ex- 
hibited in  those  departments  of  God's  works  which  bear  the  closest 
relation  to  man.  This  is  a  circumstance  worthy  of  being  noticed. 
We  may  have  occasion  afterwards  to  inquire  into  the  final  cause, 
or  the  purpose  served  by  it,  but  meanwhile  we  merely  mark  the 
circumstance  itself.  It  is,  as  we  come  closer  to  man,  that  we  find 
the  elements  of  uncertainty  becoming  more  and  more  numerous. 
The  net  becomes  more  closely  woven  and  complicated  the  nearer 
we  come  to  him  who  is  restrained  by  it.  How  uncertain,  for  in- 
stance, are  all  the  events  on  which  man's  bodily  and  external 
welfare  depends.  Man  is  dependent  on  the  weather  for  the  means 
of  sustenance,  and  that  weather  is  made  so  variable  that  its 
changes  cannot  be  anticipated.  "  Not  one  of  the  agents,"  says 
Humboldt,  '-such  as  light,  heat,  the  elasticity  of  vapors,  and  elec- 
tricity, which  perform  so  important  a  part  in  the  aerial  ocean,  can 
exercise  any  influence  without  the  result  produced  being  speedily 
modified  by  the  simultaneous  intervention  of  all  the  other  agents." 
"  The  confusion  of  appearances  often  becomes  inextricable,  and 
forbids  the  hope  of  our  ever  being  able  to  foresee,  except  within 
the  narrowest  limits,  the  changes  of  the  atmosphere,  of  which  the 
anticipated  knowledge  possesses  such  an  interest  in  regard  to  the 
cultivation  of  orchards  and  fields,  to  navigation,  and  the  welfare 
and  the  pleasures  of  mankind."  t  Nor  is  the  whole  course  of 
events,  on  which  a  man's  earthly  destiny  depends,  more  fixed  or 
easily  determined.  But  nowhere  is  this  complication,  with  its  con-' 
sequent  uncertainty  and  human  dependence,  so  strikingly  displayed 
as  in  the  constitution  of  man's  bodily  frame.  The  most  wonder- 
ful and  ingenious  of  the  physical  works  of  God  on  the  earth,  it  is 
*  See  Lucretius,  passim.  -j-  Cosmos. 


THE    PROVIDENCE    OF    GOD.  171 

also  the  most  complex.  Every  one  part  is  so  dependent  on  every 
other,  that  the  least  derangement  (and  they  are  all  liable  to  de- 
rangement) in  any  one  of  its  organs  may  terminate  in  excruciating 
anguish,  or  wasting  disease,  or  immediate  death.  A  cut  is  inflicted 
on  the  thumb,  and  ends  in  lock-jaw.  A  sudden  change  takes 
place  in  the  atmosphere  of  which  the  individual  breathes,  and 
quickens  into  life  a  malady  which  wastes  the  lungs  arid  the  frame 
till  it  ends  in  dissolution.  A  particular  vital  vessel  bursts,  and  in- 
stant death  follows.  A  derangement  takes  place  in  the  nerves  or 
brain,  and  henceforth  the  mind  itself  reels  and  staggers.  It  ap- 
pears that  the  uncertainty  increases  the  nearer  we  come  to  man, 
and  there  is  nothing  so  uncertain  as  bodily  health  and  human 
destiny. 

Our  scientific  inquirers,  in  investigating  the  separate  laws  of 
nature,  have  not  sufficiently  attended  to  that  PARTICULAR  DIS- 
POSITION AND  DISTRIBUTION  OP  THE  LAWS  which  necessarily 
issues  in  the  uncertainty  and  fortuity  which  everywhere  meet 
our  eye.  Atheism,  finding  that  it  cannot  blot  out  the  Light  from 
these  heavens,  has,  out  of  this  seeming  desolation  and  disorder, 
endeavored  to  raise  a  cloud  of  dust  that  may  conceal  that  light 
from  the  view.  Unbelief,  in  gloomy  waywardness,  wanders  for- 
ever among  these  tangled  woods  and  briars,  and  can  find  no  out- 
let or  road  with  an  onward  direction.  The  devout  spirit,  too,  ob- 
serves this  strange  complication  ;  and  in  doing  so,  it  wonders  and 
adores,  and  acknowledges  that  even  when  the  most  likely  means 
are  used,  they  cannot  produce  the  end  contemplated  withgut 
what  is  expressly  called  the  BLESSING  OF  HEAVEN. 

This  prevalence  of  accident  cannot,  as  some  may  be  tempted 
to  imagine,  be  accidental.  It  is  in  the  very  constitution  of  things. 
It  is  one  of  the  most  marked  characteristics  of  the  state  of  the 
world  in  which  our  lot  is  cast.  It  is,  in  fact,  the  grand  means 
which  the  Governor  of  the  world  employs  for  the  accomplishment 
of  his  specific  purposes,  and  by  which  his  providence  is  rendered 
a  particular  providence,  reaching  to  the  most  minute  incidents, 
and  embracing  all  events  and  every  event.  It  is  the  especial  in- 
strument employed  by  him  to  keep  man  dependent,  and  make 
him  feel  his  dependence.  A  living  writer  of  great  genius  has  de- 
scribed the  fact  of  which  we  are  seeking  to  give  an  explanation. 
"  But  there  is  a  higher  government  of  men,"  says  Isaac  Taylor, 
"  as  moral  and  religious  beings,  which  is  carried  on  chiefly  by 
means  of  the  fortuities  of  life.  Those  unforeseen  accidents,  which 


172  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

so  often  control  the  lot  of  men,  constitute  a  superstratum  in  the 
system  of  human  affairs,  wherein  peculiarly  the  Divine  providence 
holds  empire  for  the  accomplishment  of  its  special  purposes.  It  is 
from  this  hidden  and  inexhaustible  mine  of  all  chances,  as  we  must 
call  them,  that  the  Governor  of  the  world  draws,  with  unfathom- 
able skill,  the  materials  of  his  dispensation  towards  each  indivi- 
dual of  mankind."* 

If,  in  contemplating  the  general  order  that  pervades  the  world, 
we  seem  to  fall  in  with  beautiful  figures  rectilinear  and  circular, 
we  feel  now,  in  dealing  with  these  fortuities,  that  we  are  ascend- 
ing to  curves  of  a  higher  order,  and  figures  of  greater  complexity, 
or  rather  as  if  we  had  got  an  infinitesimal  calculus,  in  which  every 
one  thing  is  infinitely  small,  but  in  which  the  infinite  units  pro- 
duce magnitudes  and  forces  infinitely  great.  The  curves  are 
sometimes  difficult  of  quadrature,  and  the  differentials  not  easy  to 
be  integrated,  but  still  they  form  an  instrument  unequalled  at 
once  for  its  potency  and  its  pliability,  its  wide-extended  range, 
and  the  certainty  with  which  it  hits  the  point  at  which  it  aims. 


ILLUSTRATIVE  NOTE  (c.)— COMPLEXITY  OF  NATURE,  PHENOMENA  CLASSI- 
FIED ACCORDING  AS  THEY  ARE  MORE  OR  LESS  COMPLICATED. 

The  complexity  of  nature  is  one  of  its  characteristics,  which  is 
often  overlooked  in  the  present  day  by  persons  who  are  endeavor- 
ing to  discover  the  universality  of  law.  Yet  we  hold  it  to  be  one 
ofy-he  most  wonderful  of  the  peculiarities  of  this  world. 

It  is,  if  we  do  not  mistake,  this  complication  of  the  causes  and 
laws  of  nature,  taken  always  in  connection  with  the  limited  na- 
ture of  man's  faculties,  which  renders  it  so  imperative  on  the  part 
of  the  scientific  inquirer  to  proceed  in  the  inductive  method.  Had 
the  works  of  God  been  differently  disposed,  and  had  the  various 
bodies,  in  particular,  been  less  complex  in  their  relation  to  one 
another,  it  is  conceivable  that  a  different  mode  of  investigation 
might  have  been  available.  Could  the  different  properties  of  sub- 
stances, as  being  kept  clear  and  distinct,  have  been  discovered  by 
easy  and  direct  observation,  investigation  would  have  consisted 
very  much  in  inference,  and  the  deductive  method,  as  the  most 
practicable,  would  have  been  universally  employed.  It  is  the  mul- 
tiplicity of  relations  in  the  disposition  of  the  physical  world  which  so 
baffles  all  a  priori  speculation,  and  which  compels  the  inquirer  to 

*  Nat.  Hist,  of  Enthusiasm. 


COMPLEXITY    OP    NATURE.  173 

begin  with  a  laborious  investigation  of  facts,  with  the  view  of  de- 
termining the  laws  according  to  which  these  facts  occur,  that 
thence  he  may  rise  to  a  knowledge  of  the  properties  of  the  differ- 
ent bodies.  Hence  we  suspect  the  necessity  for  diligent  observa- 
tion and  experiment,  and  careful  compilation  and  colligation, 
before  man  can  master  any  domain  in  nature.  Had  nature  been 
throughout  at  once  simple  and  clear  in  the  order  which  it  follows, 
we  cannot  see  that  there  would  have  been  such  need  of  a  laborious 
preparation.  In  such  a  state  of  things  man  could  have  deter- 
mined beforehand  what  nature  must  be  in  every  one  of  its  ter- 
ritories, as  easily  as  the  astronomer  can  tell  the  position  of  the 
moon  or  planets  ten  or  twenty  years  hence. 

There  is  one  profound  (though  offensively  arrogant)  thinker  of 
our  day  who  has  not  overlooked  this  characteristic  of  nature.  We 
allude  to  M.  Auguste  Comte,  who,  in  his  work  on  Positive  Philo- 
sophy, has  given  a  classification  of  the  sciences,  arranged  accord- 
ing as  the  phenomena  of  which  they  treat  are  more  or  less  simple, 
or  less  or  more  complicated. 

The  two  ablest  works  ever  written  on  the  Philosophy  of  the 
Inductive  Sciences  are,  in  our  estimation,  those  of  Dr.  Whewell 
in  this  country,  and  of  M.  Auguste  Comte  in  France.  Not  that 
we  regard  either  work  as  perfect ;  in  order  to  such  a  work,  the 
two  would  require  to  be  combined  by  a  person  of  talent  equal  to 
the  one  or  the  other,  and  this  will  not  readily  be  found.  When 
Dr.  Whewell  errs  it  is  on  the  side  of  an  excess  of  first  principles, 
and  a  multiplication  of  divisions.  The  other,  led  by  a  dogmatic 
spirit  as  unphilosophical  as  it  is  profane,  errs  far  more  egregiously 
in  culpable  oversight,  and  in  following  a  delusive  simplicity. 
We  are  now  to  use  some  of  the  observations  of  the  latter  to  con- 
firm the  views  set  forth  in  this  Treatise,  in  the  same  way  as  we 
have  already  employed  those  of  the  former. 

"  In  considering,"  he  says,  "  observable  phenomena,  we  shall 
see  that  it  is  possible  to  classify  them  into  a  small  number  of 
natural  categories,  disposed  in  such  a  manner  that  the  natural 
study  of  each  category  may  be  founded  on  the  principal  laws  of 
the  preceding  category,  and  become  the  foundation  of  that  which 
follows.  This  order  is  determined  by  the  degree  of  simplicity, 
or  that  which  comes  to  the  same  thing,  by  the  degree  of  gene- 
rality of  phenomena,  from  which  results  their  mutual  depend- 
ence and  the  greater  or  less  facility  of  studying  them.  It  is 
clear,  in  fact,  a  priori,  that  the  phenomena  which  are  the  most 


174  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

simple,  those  which  complicate  themselves  the  least  with  the 
others,  are  also  the  most  general."*  Following  this  principle,  he 
arranges  phenomena  into  two  great  divisions — those  that  are  un- 
organized being  the  most  simple,  and  those  that  are  organized 
being  more  complicated.  Taking  up  inorganic  nature,  he  places 
astronomy  at  the  head  of  his  hierarchy  of  the  natural  sciences. 
"Astronomical  phenomena  being  the  most  general,  the  most 
simple,  the  most  abstract,  it  is  evidently  by  the  study  of  them 
that  we  ought  to  commence  natural  philosophy,  and  the  laws  to 
which  they  are  subjected  have  an  influence  on  those  of  all  other 
phenomena,  while  they  are  themselves,  on  the  other  hand,  essen- 
tially independent."!  He  then  goes  on  to  show  that  terrestrial 
physics  is  a  more  complicated  science  than  astronomy.  "The 
simple  movement  of  a  falling  body,  even  when  it  is  a  solid,  pre- 
sents, in  reality,  when  we  take  into  account  all  the  determining 
circumstances,  a  subject  of  research  more  complicated  than  the 
most  difficult  question  of  astronomy."!:  Proceeding  to  terrestrial 
physics,  he  shows  that  it  is  capable  of  being  divided  into  two  parts, 
according  as  we  examine  bodies  under  a  mechanical  or  chemical 
point  of  view.  Of  these  the  former  is  evidently  the  simpler  and 
more  general,  as  all  the  properties  of  matter  considered  in  physics, 
such  as  gravity,  re-appear  along  with  other  properties  in  chemistry. 
Rising  to  organic  bodies,  he  divides  the  phenomena  which  pre- 
sent themselves  into  two  classes — those  which  relate  to  the  indi- 
vidual, and  those  which  relate  to  the  species — giving  rise  to  what 
he  calls  organic  physics  and  social  physics.  As  the  result  of  this 
discussion  philosophy  finds  itself  naturally  divided  into  five  fun- 
damental sciences,  of  which  the  succession  is  determined  by  a 
subordination,  necessary  and  invariable,  founded,  independently 
of  all  hypothetical  opinion,  upon  the  simple  comparison,  in  a  pro- 
found manner,  of  the  corresponding  phenomena — these  are,  astro- 
nomy, physics,  chemistry,  physiology,  and  finally,  social  physics. 
The  first  considers  phenomena  the  most  general,  the  most  ab- 
stract, and  the  farthest  removed  from  humanity,  and  which  have 
an  influence  on  all  others  without  being  influenced  by  them. 
The  phenomena  considered  in  the  last  are,  on  the  contrary,  the 
most  particular,  the  most  complicated,  the  most  concrete,  the  most 
directly  interesting  to  man,  and  depend  more  or  less  on  the  pre- 
ceding, without  exercising  any  influence  upon  them.  Between 
these  two  extremes,  the  degrees  of  specialty,  of  complication. 
«  VoL  L  pp.  86,  87.  f  P.  91.  \  P.  92. 


COMPLEXITY    OP    NATURE.  176 

and  of  the  personality  of  phenomena,  go  on  gradually  augment- 
ing, as  also  their  successive  dependence* 

It  is  not  to  our  present  purpose  to  inquire  into  the  merits  of  this 
encyclopediacal  division  of  the  inductive  sciences  as  compared 
with  other  schemes.  We  have  alluded  to  it  in  order  to  call  the 
attention  to  the  great  truth  fixed  on  its  basis,  and  to  the  place 
which  this  basis  gives  to  different  natural  phenomena,  which  are 
arranged  according  as  they  are  less  or  more  complicated,  far- 
ther from  or  nearer  to  humanity. 

There  are  certain  phenomena  so  simple  and  so  little  compli- 
cated, that  science,  without  much  difficulty,  arranges  them  into  a 
system.  In  these  departments  of  nature  science  first  made  pro- 
gress, and  has  continued  to  this  day  to  make  the  greatest  progress. 
In  other  parts  of  the  works  of  God,  the  phenomena  are  more  in- 
volved in  their  relations,  and  in  them  physical  inquiry  had  made 
the  latest  and  the  least  advancement.  It  is  owing  to  this  differ- 
ence of  complication  that  astronomy  and  physics  have  made  great 
progress  when  compared  with  the  physiology  of  plants  and  ani- 
mals. In  some  of  the  departments  of  the  sciences  which  deal  with 
complex  data,  M.  Comte  acknowledges  that  it  will  be  difficult  or 
impossible  ever  to  arrive  at  clearly  defined  laws. 

The  grand  aim  of  science  he  states  to  be  the  discovery  of  laws  5 
and  through  this  discovery,  the  attainment  of  foresight,  and  the 
power  of  acting  on  nature.  "  We  ought  to  conceive  the  study  of 
nature,  as  destined  to  furnish  the  true  rational  basis  of  the  action 
of  man  upon  nature,  because  the  knowledge  of  the  laws  of  phe- 
nomena, of  which  the  invariable  result  is  foresight,  and  it  alone, 
can  conduct  us  in  active  life  to  modify  them,  the  one  by  the  other, 
to  our  advantage.  In  short,  SCIENCE  WHENCE  FORESIGHT, 
FORESIGHT  WHENCE  ACTION,  such  is  the  simple  formula  which 
expresses  in  the  simplest  manner  the  general  relation  of  science 
and  art."  t  In  the  least  complicated  departments  of  nature,  sci- 
ence having  discovered  a  number  of  laws,  gives  considerable  scope 
to  foresight ;  and  man  is  enabled  to  adapt  his  actions  to  what  he 
foresees.  In  other  fields  in  which  the  arrangements  are  more  com- 
plicated, foreknowledge,  and  the  power  which  foreknowledge  con- 
fers, have  as  yet  a  very  limited  range ;  and  there  are  parts  of 
God's  works,  in  regard  to  which  it  may  be  doubted  whether  sci- 
ence shall  ever  be  able  to  discover  the  assemblage  of  laws,  or  art 
to  turn  them  to  any  profitable  use. 

»  Pp.  96,  97.  f  VbLipp.62,68. 


176 


ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 


The  complication  of  nature,  so  baffling  to  human  investigation, 
appears  most  strikingly  in  organized  bodies.  M.  Comte  says — 
"Every  property  of  an  organized  body,  be  it  geometric,  be  it  me- 
chanical, be  it  chemical,  be  it  vital,  is  subjected,  in  its  quantity,  to 
immense  numerical  variations  altogether  irregular,  which  succeed 
each  other  at  the  briefest  intervals,  under  the  influence  of  a  host 
of  circumstances  exterior  and  interior,  and  themselves  variable  in 
such  a  way  that  all  idea  of  fixed  numbers,  and  in  consequence  of 
mathematical  laws,  such  as  we  can  hope  to  find,  imply  in  reality 
a  contradiction  to  the  special  nature  of  the  class  of  phenomena. 
Thus,  when  we  wish  to  value  with  precision  even  the  most  simple 
qualities  of  a  living  being — for  example,  its  mean  density,  or  that 
of  one  of  its  principal  parts,  its  temperature,  the  force  of  its  inter- 
nal circulation,  the  proportion  of  immediate  elements  that  com- 
pose its  solids  or  its  fluids,  the  quantity  of  oxygen  which  it  con- 
sumes in  a  given  time,  the  mass  of  its  absorptions  and  continual 
exhalations,  &c.,  and  still  more,  the  energy  of  its  muscular  pow- 
ers, the  intensity  of  its  impressions,  &c., — it  is  needful  not  only, 
as  is  evident,  to  make  for  each  of  these  results  as  many  observa- 
tions as  there  are  species  or  races,  and  of  varieties  in  each  spe- 
cies, we  need  farther  to  measure  the  changes,  not  inconsiderable, 
which  this  quantity  experiences  in  passing  from  one  individual  to 
another  ;  and  in  reference  to  the  same  individual,  according  to  its 
age,  its  state  of  health,  or  disease,  its  internal  disposition,  and  the 
circumstances  of  all  kinds,  and  these  incessantly  changing,  under 
the  influence  of  which  it  finds  itself  placed,  such  as  the  constitu- 
tion of  the.  atmosphere,  &c.  It  is  the  same  in  a  still  higher  de- 
gree with  social  phenomena,  which  present  a  yet  greater  compli- 
cation, and  by  consequence  a  yet  greater  variableness."  He  goes 
on  to  say,  "  that  which  engenders  this  irregular  variability  of  the 
effect,  is  the  great  number  of  different  agents  determining  at  the 
same  time  the  same  phenomena ;  and  from  which  it  results  in 
the  most  complicated  phenomena,  that  there  are  not  two  cases 
precisely  alike.  We  have  no  occasion,  in  order  to  find  such  a 
difficulty,  to  go  to  the  phenomena  of  living  bodies.  It  presents 
itself  already  in  bodies  without  life,  when  we  consider  the  most 
complex  cases — for  example,  in  studying  meteorological  phenom- 
ena." This  advocate  of  the  progress  and  power  of  knowledge  is 
obliged  to  admit, — "  Their  multiplicity  renders  the  effects  as  ir- 
regularly variable  as  if  ev.ery  cause  had  not  been  subjected  to 
any  precise  condition" * 

*  Pp.  153-156. 


COMPLEXITY    OF    NATURE.  177 

It  is  only  in  certain  departments  of  God's  works  that  we  can 
ever  attain  to  anything  like  complete  science,  to  extensive  fore- 
sight, or  that  power  which  knowledge  confers.  And  let  it  be 
especially  remarked,  that  human  science  and  human  sagacity 
and  human  potency  fail  most  in  those  parts  of  nature  with  which 
man  is  most  intimately  connected.  As  M.  Comte  again  and 
again  remarks,  the  phenomena  which  are  the  most  simple  and 
general,  and  therefore  the  most  easily  arranged  into  a  science,  are 
those  "  which  are  at  the  farthest  distance  from  man,"  *  and  the 
"farthest  removed  from  humanity."  Thus  the  heavenly  bodies, 
while  utterly  beyond  man's  reach  or  control,  furnish  in  their  laws 
and  movements  the  easiest  conquests  to  science.  The  most  diffi- 
cult problem  in  astronomy,  that  of  the  three  bodies,  is  less  com- 
plex than  the  most  simple  terrestrial  problem.  On  the  other 
hand,  those  phenomena  which  are  the  most  complicated,  are  the 
nearest  to  man,  and  the  most  directly  interesting  to  him.f  The 
laws  of  chemistry,  for  instance,  on  which  man's  sustenance  so  im- 
mediately depends,  are  more  complicated  than  the  movements  of 
the  heavenly  bodies,  or  the  mere  mechanical  laws  of  matter.  The 
complication  increases  according  as  the  objects  attain  a  higher 
degree  of  organization,  and  becomes  the  greatest  of  all  in  the 
bodily  frame  of  man,  and  in  that  frame  in  the  nervous  system, 
the  part  most  intimately  connected  with  the  operations  of  the 
mind.  When  the  social  element  is  introduced,  and  animals  and 
mankind  are  considered  in  their  connection  with  one  another,  the 
complication,  and  consequently  the  difficulty  of  attaining  fore- 
knowledge and  control  over  nature,  is  greatly  increased.  The  le- 
gitimate conclusion  is,  not  a  conclusion  drawn  by  M.  Comte,  but 
a  conclusion  legitimately  drawn  from  his  observations,  that  man 
is  impotent  in  regard  to  the  objects  whose  laws  he  can  discover, 
and  that  he  is  ignorant  and  dependent  in  regard  to  the  objects 
nearest  himself,  and  with  which  he  is  most  intimately  connected. 

The  distribution  of  physical  phenomena  made  by  M.  Comte, 
will  be  found  when  sifted  to  have  a  double  basis,  and  to  proceed 
on  two  separate  principles.  He  arranges  nature  according  as  it  i.-< 
less  complicated  or  more  complicated  ;  but  he  arranges  it  also  ac- 
cording as  it  is  more  removed  or  less  removed  from  the  control  of 
humanity.  Now,  we  cannot  discover  that  these  two  are  the  same 
by  any  necessity  in  the  natnrt  of  things.  They  correspond  in 
fact;  but  this  is  not  by  any  necessity,  (though  M.  Comte  seems 

*  P.  88.  t  P.  96- 

12 


178  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

to  think  so,)  but  by  the  appointment  of  God.  We  cannot  see 
how  the  phenomena  farthest  removed  from  humanity  should 
necessarily  be  the  most  simple  and  easily  determined  by  science, 
nor  that  the  phenomena  with  which  man  is  most  intimately  in- 
volved must  needs  be  the  most  complicated.  We  observe  ,n- 
deed,  the  converse  parallelism  of  the  two-;  and  that,  in  fact,  the 
most  simple  phenomena  are  the  farthest  from  human  control, 
and  that  the  phenomena  nearest  to  man,  and  most  under  his 
power,  are  the  most  complicated ;  but  we  believe  that  this  par- 
allelism is  by  the  special  appointment  of  the  Governor  of  the 
world. 

There  are  domains  of  nature  in  which  man's  foresight  is  con- 
siderably extended  and  accurate,  and  other  domains  in  which  it  is 
very  limited,  or  very  dim  and  confused.  Again,  there  are  depart- 
ments of  nature  in  which  man's  influence  is  considerable,  and 
others  which  lie  altogether  beyond  his  control,  directly  or  indi- 
rectly. Now,  on  comparing  these  classes  of  objects,  we  find  them  to 
have  a  cross  or  converse  relation  to  one  another.  Where  man'? 
foreknowledge  is  extensive,  he  has  either  no  power,  or  his  power 
is  limited  ;  and  where  his  power  might  be  exerted,  his  foresight  is 
contracted.  His  power  of  anticipating  distant  consequences,  or  of 
prediction,  is  greatest  in  regard  to  astronomical  movements,  or 
great  physical  changes  ;  and  here  the  agents  are  beyond  his  con 
trol.  His  influence  can  be  exercised  over  agents  with  which  he 
is  more  nearly  connected,  as  over  his  own  bodily  frame,  and  the 
animal  and  vegetable  kingdoms  ;  but  here  his  foresight  is  restricted 
within  very  narrow  limits.  He  can  draw  out  an  astronomical 
almanac  for  centuries  to  come,  but  he  cannot  tell  in  what  state 
any  one  animate  object  that  is  dear  to  him  may  be  on  the  morrow. 
He  can  tell  in  what  position  a  satellite  of  Saturn  will  be  a  hun- 
dred years  after  this  present  time,  but  he  cannot  say  how  his  bodily 
health  shall  be  an  hour  hence.  The  objects  within  the  range  of 
marts  foresight  are  placed  beyond  his  power ;  while  the  objects 
within  his  power,  lie  beyond  his  foresight.  In  the  one  case,  man's 
knowledge  increases  without  an  increase  of  his  power :  and  in  the 
other,  his  power  is  rendered  ineffectual  by  his  want  of  knowledge. 
By  the  one  contrivance  as  by  the  other,  while  not  shut  out  from 
knowledge  on  the  ojie  hand,  nor  precluded  from  activity  on  the 
other,  he  is  yet,  both  in  regard  to  his  knowledge  and  activity,  ren- 
dered dependent  on  the  arrangements  of  heaven. 

We  do  not  mean  to  undervalue  the  power  which  knowledge 


^COMPLEXITY    OP    NATURE.  179 

^confers  ;  but  there  are  anticipations  entertained  in  the  present  day 
on  this  subject  which  are  destined  to  meet  with  bitter  disappoint- 
ment. Knowledge  must  extend  in  one  or  other  of  two  depart- 
ments ;  either  in  departments  of  nature  beyond  man's  reach,  as  in 
nose  investigated  in  astronomy  and  natural  philosophy,  or  in  de- 
partments more  within  his  control,  and  which  fall  under  chemistry 
and  natural  history,  under  physiology  and  political  and  social 
economy.  But  so  far  as  knowledge  increases  in  the  former,  it 
brings  with  it  no  efficient  power,  for  the  objects  are  beyond  his  in- 
fluence. He  cannot  control  the  smallest  satellite  or  aerolite  in  its 
couuse,  or  direct  any  of  the  great  physical  agents  of  nature.  No 
doubt,  there  are  other  natural  objects  within  his  reach,  and  he  can 
experiment  on  the  chemical  elements,  and  make  new  dispositions 
of  the  vegetable  and  animal  worlds  ;  but  then,  in  regard  to  these 
agents  of  nature,  his  foreknowledge  is  very  contracted ;  for  they 
are  so  involved  with  one  another,  that  it  would  require  a  superhu- 
man sagacity,  from  a  knowledge  of  the  laws,  to  predict  the  actual 
results.  Man  can  tell  how  fast  the  earth  moves  in  its  orbit ;  but 
his  knowledge  does  not  enable  him  to  stay  it,  or  hasten  it  in  its 
course.  He  can  experiment  with  the  elements  of  the  atmosphere ; 
but  he  cannot  tell  how  the  wind  may  be  blowing  at  the  close  of 
his  experiment.  He  can  reach  the  plants  and  animals  around  him, 
and  so  far  modify  them  ;  but  then  the  plant  which  he  is  training 
with  such  pains  may  die  in  the  midst  of  his  operations;  and  the 
animated  being  which  he  expects  to  help  him,  may  be  carried  off 
by  disease  when  its  aid  was  most  required. 

Knowledge  is  power,  and  why  is  it  power?  because  it  imparts 
foresight,  and  foresight  furnishes  control.  There  is  first  knowledge, 
then  foresight,  and  then  action.  But  we  see  that  there  are  bar- 
riers both  to  the  foresight  and  to  the  action — harriers  against  which 
human  pride  may  chafe  and  rage,-  but  which  it  cannot  break 
down.  Where  the  foresight  is  large,  the  action  is  restrained  ;  and 
where  the  field  of  action  is  wide,  the  foresight  is  confined.  The 
confident  expectations  of  the  power  accruing  from  knowledge,  could 
be  realized  only  by  the  foresight  ever  imparting  a  power  of  action  ; 
and  by  the  power  of  action  having  provided  for  it  an  available 
foresight.  But  there  are  limits  to  the  one  and  to  the  other  ;  and 
where  the  one  is  enlarged,  the  other  is  confined  ;  and  where  power 
is  given  in  the  one,  it  is  counteracted  by  a  corresponding  weak- 
ness in  the  other.  No  doubt,  there  is  great  room  as  knowledge 
increases,  at  once  for  advancing  foresight  and  action ;  but  still 


180  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE* 

there  are  necessary  limits  to  both  ;  and  all,  that  man  may  feel  his- 
dependence  alike  in  the  one  as  in  the  other  on  the  government  of 
God.  Human  sagacity  and  activity  will  both  increase  as  the 
world  grows  older ;  but  both  the  one  and  the  other  will  find  checks 
raised  to  humble  them  in  their  very  extension.  No  man  feels  his 
impotence  more  than  he  who  knows  all  the  courses  of  the  starsr 
and  yet  feels  that  he  cannot  influence  them  in  the  least  degree, 
except  it  be  the  person  who  feels  himself  surrounded  by  agents 
which  he  can  to  some  extent  control,  but  which  in  a  far  higher 
degree  control  him,  and  disappoint,  by  their  unexpected  move- 
ments, his  best-laid  schemes.  The  farther  human  knowledge 
penetrates,  it  discovers,  with  a  painful  sense  of  weakness,  the  more 
objects  utterly  beyond  its  control,  and  moving  on  in  their  own  in- 
dependent sphere.  The  greater  human  activity  becomes,  it  com- 
plicates the  more  the  relations  of  human  society,  and  the  relations 
of  man  to  the  most  capricious  of  the  agents  of  nature ;  and  the 
greater  the  power  he  exerts,  he  feels  himself  the  more  powerless  in 
the  grasp  of  a  higher  power.  Increased  knowledge  should  make 
him  bow  in  deeper  reverence  before  infinite  knowledge ;  and  his 
own  augmented  action  cause  him  to  acknowledge,  in  a  deeper 
feeling  of  helplessness,  the  irresistible  power  of  the  action  of  the 
Almighty. 

Such  seems  to  be  the  lessons  to  be  gathered  from  a  survey  of 
those  domains  of  nature  which  science  investigates  in  the  hope  of 
discovering  laws.  Starting  from  astronomy,  and  thence  going  to 
physics,  chemistry,  and  thence  to  physiology  and  social  physics, 
we  are  coming  closer  to  objects  with  which  man  is  more  nearly 
connected ;  but  find,  as  we  proceed,  these  objects  becoming  more 
and  more  complicated.  And  there  are  domains  lying  altogether 
beyond  those  claimed  by  science  ;  and  these  are  still  more  com- 
plex in  their  nature,  and  bear  a  still  more  intimate  relation  to 
man.  There  are  phenomena,  in  which  science  never  attempts  to 
discover  law — they  are  so  intricate  and  involved,  and  these  fur- 
nish the  most  potent  of  the  agents  employed  by  God  in  the  govern- 
ment of  man.  These  are  the  phenomena  which  we  are  seeking 
in  the  text  to  catch  as  they  fly  past  us,  and  to  examine. 


ACCOMPLISHMENT    OF    THE    DIVINE    PURPOSES.  181 


SECTION  IL— POWERFUL   AND  VARIED  MEANS   FURNISHED  BY 

THESE  FORTUITIES  FOR  THE  ACCOMPLISHMENT  OF  THE 

DIVINE   PURPOSES. 

"  It  is  quite  evident,"  says  Dr.  Brown,*  "  that  even  Omnipo- 
tence, which  cannot  do  what  is  contradictory,  cannot  combine 
both  advantages — the  advantage  of  regular  order  in  the  sequences 
of  nature,  and  the  advantages  of  an  uniform  adaptation  of  the 
particular  circumstances  of  the  moment  to  the  particular  circum- 
stances of  the  individual.  We  may  take  our  choice,  but  we  can- 
not think  of  a  combination  of  both  ;  and  if,  as  is  very  obvious,  the 
greater  advantage  be  that  of  uniformity  of  operation,  we  must  not 
complain  of  evils,  to  which  that  very  uniformity  which  we  cannot 
fail  to  prefer — if  the  option  had  been  allowed  us — has  been  the 
very  circumstance  that  gave  rise." 

We  are  not  obliged  to  take  our  choice  between  the  one  or  the  other 
of  the  two  alternatives  propounded.  The  combination  spoken  of 
as  being  beyond  human  thought,  is  realized  in  the  works  of  God ; 
and  in  order  to  discover  it,  we  need  only  to  open  our  eyes  suffi- 
ciently wide  to  take  in  the  double  method  which  God  employs  in 
his  providence.  God  cannot  do  things  which  are  contradictory, 
but  he  can  reconcile  things  which  may  seem  to  us  to  be  contra- 
dictory. Things  which  appear  incompatible  to  human  wisdom, 
are  found  in  harmonious  union  and  co-operation  in  the  works  of 
God.  It  is  in  the  happy  combination  of  apparent  contradictions 
that  we  discover  one  of  the  most  wonderful  properties  of  the  Divine 
administration. 

The  system  of  regular  laws  has  its  advantages ;  and  we  have 
been  at  pains  to  point  them  out  in  the  last  chapter.  But  as  Dr. 
Brown  perceives,  it  has  also,  if  uncontrolled,  its  disadvantages.  It 
is  easy  to  conceive  what  prejudicial  effects  would  follow  from  the 
unbending  operation  of  natural  laws,  if  they  were  never  curbed  or 
restrained.  Every  one  of  the  laws  might  be  good  in  itself,  and  yet 
incidental  effects  might  follow,  fitted  to  inflict  injustice  on  individ- 
uals, and  the  greatest  injury  on  society.  The  doctrine  of  a  narrow 
philosophy,  which  admits  of  nothing  but  uncompromising  law,  has 
always  been  felt  to  be  a  very  uncomfortable  one.  Truly  it  is  little 
consolation  to  the  man  disabled  for  life  by  an  accident  which  he 
could  neither  have  anticipated  nor  prevented,  to  tell  him,  in  an- 
swer to  the  groans  which  his  pain  is  wringing  from  him,  that  his 

*  Lect.  94. 


182  VARIED    MEANS    FOR    THE 

calamity  occurred  through  a  very  beautiful  lawr  that  it  is  a  good 
thing  that  stones  fall  and  that  fire  burns,  and  thus  brought  down 
that  building,  in  the  ruins  of  which  he  was  found.  The  widow's 
tears  which  flow  as  she  weeps  over  a  husband  whose  ship  has  per- 
ished in  the  waters,  will  not  be  dried  up  by  the  mere  observer  of 
mechanical  laws  coming  to  her  and  explaining  that  winds  blow 
and  waves  rage,  and  that  it  is  for  the  advantage  of  mankind  that 
they  should.  To  those  who  could  bring  no  other  consolation,  the 
heart  would  respond,  "  Miserable  comforters  are  ye  all,  ye  are  phy- 
sicians of  no  value." 

The  mind  of  man  has  ever  instinctively  recoiled  from  all  the  at- 
tempts which  have  been  made  to  persuade  it  that  there  is  nothing 
in  the  world  but  all-sweeping  and  unbending  general  law.  And 
truly  the  hearts  of  our  peasantry  have  been  wiser  in  such  -matters 
than  the  heads  of  our  philosophers. 

Is  there  no  way  by  which  all  the  advantages  arising  from  the 
fixed  sequences,  and  the  regular  courses  of  nature,  may  be  secured 
without  our  being  obliged  to  submit  to  the  disadvantages  which 
are  supposed  to  be  inherent  in  the  system  ?  There  is  such  a 
method,  we  believe,  devised  by  the  wisdom  of  God,  and  displayed 
in  actual  operation  in  his  providence. 

It  is  by  the  property  of  the  Divine  government  to  which  our 
attention  was  called  in  the  last  section,  that  God  succeeds  in  ac- 
complishing his  individual  ends  and  purposes.  He  has  so  distrib- 
uted and  arranged  material  substances,  that  their  laws  now 
check  and  restrain,  and  now  assist  each  other.  A  law  is  in  its 
very  nature  stiff  and  unaccommodating,  and  God  has  seen  fit  to 
counteract  the  evil  consequences  of  one  law  by  the  operations  of 
other  laws.  By  this  means,  he  varies  the  dread  uniformity  of 
natural  laws  ;  and  arrests,  at  the  proper  time,  the  prejudicial  re- 
sults that  would  follow  from  their  unbending  mode  of  operation. 
By  this  means,  too,  he  can  produce  effects  which  would  never 
have  followed  from  the  operations  of  these  laws  acting  singly. 
By  their  combination  or  collision,  results  issue  which,  in  respect 
of  magnitude  and  rapidity,  far  transcend  the  power  of  any  one 
property  of  matter.  This  instrument  employed  by  God  may  be 
compared  to  the  screw,  which  is  a  mechanical  power  as  well  as 
the  lever,  or  rather  it  is  a  complicated  set  of  levers  ;  and  correspond- 
ing to  it,  we  have,  in  the  tortuous  and  yet  nicely  adjusted  arrange- 
ments of  God,  a  potent  means  of  extracting  what  would  other- 


ACCOMPLISHMENT    OF    THE    DIVINE    PURPOSES.  183 

wi&e  be  fixed,  and  elevating  that  which  is  depressed,  and  all  for 
the  convenience  and  comfort  of  man. 

Nor  let  it  be  forgotten,  that  by  this  means  human  foresight  is 
lessened,  human  power  controlled,  and  man  rendered  dependent 
on  his  Maker. 

A  vessel  is  launched  upon  the  ocean,  fitted  so  far  as  human 
sagacity  can  discover  to  reach  its  destination.  But  when  it  has 
got  to  a  particular  place,  a  great  rarefaction  of  the  air  is  produced 
by  heat  in  a  particular  region  of  the  world,  the  wind  rushes  in  to 
fill  up  the  vacuum,  lashes  the  ocean  into  fury,  bears  down  upon 
the  vessel,  and,  hurrying  it  furiously  along,  dashes  it  upon  a  rock 
which  is  in  the  way,  and  scatters  the  whole  crew  upon  the  wide 
waste  of  waters.  The  greater  number  perish  ;  but  some  two  or 
three  are  able  to  lay  hold  of  portions  of  the  floating  wreck,  and 
are  borne  to  the  rock,  where  they  find  refuge  till  another  ship  op- 
portunely passing  by,  picks  them  up,  at  the  very  time  when  they 
were  ready  to  die  of  hunger.  Now,  it  is  surely  conceivable  that 
an  all-wise  and  omnipotent  God  might  have  every  link  in  this 
long  and  complicated  chain  adjusted,  with  a  special  view  of  bring- 
ing about  each  of  these  ends — the  drowning  of  some,  and  the 
saving  of  others,  after  having  designedly  exposed  them  to  dan- 
ger. Nor  in  all  this  would  there  be  any  violation  of  the  sequences 
of  nature,  or  any  suspension  of  general  laws ;  there  is  merely 
such  a  skilful  disposition  as  to  secure  the  special  ends  which  God, 
from  the  first,  contemplated. 

"  Think  we,  like  some  weak  prince,  the  Eternal  Cause 
Prone  for  his  favorites  to  reverse  his  laws ; 
Shall  burning  Etna,  if  a  sage  requires, 
Forget  to  thunder,  and  recall  her  fires ; 
On  air  or  sea  new  motions  be  imprest, 
Oh,  blameless  Bethel,  to  relieve  thy  breast; 
When  the  loose  mountain  trembles  from  on  high, 
Shall  gravitation  cease  if  you  go  by  ?"* 

Pope  has  in  these  few  lines  stated,  in  his  usual  compact  and 
sententious  manner,  what  is  commonly  called  the  philosophic 
view  of  providence.  It  is  a  system  far  enough  from  the  surface 
to  make  it  appear  deep,  but  without  going  sufficiently  far  down 
to  reach  the  foundation.  In  some  respects,  it  affords  a  worse 
basis  on  which  to  raise  a  superstructure  than  the  surface  patent 

*  Pope's  Essay  on  Man,  v.  121-128. 


184  VARIED    MEANS    FOR    THE 

to  all  would  have  done  ;  and  it  is  utterly  insecure,  because  it  has 
not  gone  down  to  the  rock.  It  has  just  a  sufficient  amount  of 
truth  to  be  plausible.  And  so  far  as  advanced  merely  with  the 
view  of  keeping1  persons  from  committing  foolish  actions,  in  the 
hope  that  God  would  interpose  to  preserve  them  from  the  natural 
consequences,  so  far  as  is  it  used  for  the  purpose  of  preventing  per- 
sons from  tempting  providence,  (to  use  the  language  of  a  very 
different  school,)  it  may  be  made  as  useful  as  it  is  unquestionably 
sound. 

But  if  meant,  as  it  is  obviously  meant,  to  keep  us  from  putting 
confidence  in  divine  providence,  and  from  feeling  our  close  and 
immediate  dependence  on  God,  it  cannot  be  condemned  in  lan- 
guage sufficiently  strong ;  for  it  would  rob  many  of  some  of  their 
deepest  and  most  abiding  consolations,  and  fostering  in  others  a 
spirit  of  pride  and  rebellion.  Nor  is  it  difficult  to  detect  the  error 
which  lurks  beneath  a  superficial  plausibility.  We  expect  not  the 
Eternal  to  change  his  laws  ;  but  it  is  because  they  have  been  so 
skilfully  arranged,  that  they  do  not  need  to  be  changed,  and  ar- 
ranged, too,  in  order  to  accomplish  all  and  each  of  his  purposes. 
We  do  not  expect  Etna  to  recal  his  fires  when  a  sage  is  near ;  or 
the  air  and  ocean  to  acquire  new  motions  to  preserve  a  saint  from 
danger;  for  if  the  sage  has  been  despising  the  laws  which  he  pro- 
fesses to  observe,  or  if  the  saint  has  been  contending  against  what 
he  regards  as  the  "  ordinances  of  heaven,"  it  may  be  the  will  of 
God  that  these  very  powers  should  be  the  means  of  destroying 
him.  But  should  these  individuals  not  be  rushing  recklessly 
against  the  known  laws  of  heaven,  or  should  it  be  the  will  of  God 
to  preserve  them,  provision  will  be  found  to  be  made  for  their 
escape  ;  and  that  not  through  the  powers  of  nature  disobeying 
their  own  laws,  but  through  other  powers  in  nature  opportunely 
presenting  themselves  to  stop,  to  turn  aside,  or  otherwise  to  modify 
their  operation.  The  volcano  may  burst,  the  tempest  may  rage, 
and  the  cliff  may  fall  in  an  instant  before  or  after  the  time  when 
they  might  have  been  followed  by  such  fatal  consequences  ;  some 
passing  impulse  of  feeling  may  have  hurried  the  individual  away; 
or  some  other  power  of  nature  may  have  hastened  to  shelter  and 
defend  him,  and  all  by  a  special  arrangement  intended  by  God 
from  the  very  beginning. 

It  is  by  means  of  these  pre-arranged  adjustments  that  God  can 
make  general  laws  accomplish  individual  ends.  By  this  agency, 
he  can  at  one  time  increase,  and  at  another  time  lessen  or  com- 


ACCOMPLISHMENT    OF    THE    DIVINE    PURPOSES.  185 

pletely  nullify  the  spontaneous  effects  of  the  fixed  properties  of 
matter.  Now,  he  can  make  the  most  powerful  agents  in  nature 
— such  as  wind,  and  fire,  and  disease — coincide  and  co-operate  to 
produce  effects  of  a  magnitude  so  tremendous  as  none  of  them 
separately  could  accomplish  ;  and  again,  he  can  arrest  their  influ- 
ence by  counteracting  agencies,  or  rather  by  making  them  coun- 
teract each  other.  He  can,  for  instance,  by  a  concurrence  of 
natural  laws,  bring  a  man,  who  is  in  the  enjoyment  of  health  at 
present,  to  the  very  borders  of  death,  an  hour  or  an  instant  hence; 
and  he  can  by  a  like  means  suddenly  restore  the  same,  or  another 
individual  to  health  after  he  has  been  on  the  very  verge  of  the 
grave.  By  the  confluence  of  two  or  more  streams,  he  can  bring 
agencies  of  tremendous  potency  to  bear  upon  the  production  of  a 
given  effect — such  as  a  war,  a  pestilence,  or  a  revolution ;  and  on 
the  other  hand,  by  drawing  aside  the  stream  into  another  chan- 
nel, he  can  arrest,  at  any  given  instant,  the  awful  effects  that 
would  otherwise  follow  from  these  agencies,  and  save  an  individual, 
a  family,  or  a  nation  from  the  evils  which  seem  ready  to  burst 
upon  them. 

Let  it  be  observed,  that  in  the  method  employed  by  God,  he 
has  not  only  the  power  which  the  separate  agents  are  fitted  to 
exercise,  but  he  has  a  farther  power  derived  from  their  skilful 
arrangement,  as  now  they  combine  and  co-operate,  through  a 
long  series  of  years  or  ages,  towards  a  given  point,  acquiring 
momentum  as  they  move  on,  and  again,  as  they  come  into  col- 
lision, and  burst  with  awful  suddenness.  Now,  we  find  causes 
which  have  been  silently  at  work  for  ages,  leading  to  a  complete 
change  in  the  manners,  customs,  and  character  of  a  nation,  or 
breaking  out  where  the  channel  in  which  they  flow  is  full,  in  ter- 
rible convulsions,  upturning  society  from  its  foundations.  At 
other  times,  we  find  the  most  skilful  of  human  arrangements,  and 
the  results  which  mankind  were  anticipating  according  to  the  laws* 
of  human  probability,  all  dissipated  and  confounded  as  by  a  spark 
falling  among  combustible  materials.  If  the  event  had  happened 
a  moment  sooner,  or  a  moment  later,  no  such  effects  would  have 
followed  ;  and  the  man  of  coldest  heart,  and  most  sophisticated 
head,  is  constrained  to  acknowledge,  that  there  has  been  a  provi- 
dence in  that  intervention,  at  a  crisis  which  has  changed  the 
whole  destiny  of  an  individual,  or  a  community,  of  a  nation,  or  a 
continent. 

If  there  are  advantages,  as  we  have  seen,  arising  in  the  provi- 


186  VARIED    MEANS    FOR    THE 

dence  of  God  from  the  uniformity  of  nature,  there  are  also  ad- 
vantages arising  from  the  uncertainty  of  nature.  Wo  see  the 
wisdom  of  God  in  the  skilful  arrangements  which  produce  sys- 
tematic operation  ;  but  we  also  see  it  in  those  equally  skilful 
arrangements  by  which  events  are  made  to  fall  out  in  a  more 
tangled  and  disorderly  manner.  We  are  now  in  circumstances  to 
discover  the  various  reasons  why  there  is  such  a  mixture  of  uni- 
formity and  variety  in  the  operations  of  nature.  Both  serve 
most  important  ends  in  the  government  of  God.  The  one  ren- 
ders nature  steady  and  stable,  the  other  active  and  accommodat- 
ing. Without  the  certainty,  man  would  waver  as  in  a  dream, 
and  wander  as  in  a  trackless  desert ;  and,  without  the  unexpected 
changes,  he  would  make  his  rounds  like  the  gin-horse  in  its 
circuit,  or  the  prisoner  on  his  wheel.  Were  nature  altogether 
capricious,  man  would  likewise  become  altogether  capricious,  for 
he  could  have  no  motive  to  steadfast  action.  Again,  were  nature 
altogether  fixed,  it  would  make  man's  character  as  cold  and  formal 
as  itself.  The  recurrences  of  nature  surround  us  by  friends  and 
familiar  faces  ;  and  we  feel  that  we  can  walk  with  security  and 
composure  in  the  scenes  in  which  our  Maker  has  placed  us.  The 
occurrences  of  nature,  on  the  other  hand,  bring  us  into  contact  with 
new  objects  and  strangers,  and  quicken  our  energies  by  means 
of  the  feelings  of  curiosity  and  astonishment  which  are  awakened. 
The  wisdom  of  God  is  seen  alike  in  what  he  hath  fixed,  and  in 
what  he  hath  left  free.  The  uniformity,  when  it  is  observed  by 
mankind,  prompts  them  to  activity,  industry,  and  perseverance  ; 
and  the  events  which  we  call  accidental,  enable  God  to  turn  the 
projects  of  mankind  as  he  pleases  towards  the  fulfilment  of  his 
own  wise  and  mysterious  ends.  Without  the  uniformity,  man 
would  be  absolutely  helpless  ;  and  without  the  contingencies,  he 
would  become  proud  and  disdainful.  If  the  progression  of  nature 
*  induces  us  to  cherish  trust  and  confidence,  its  digressions  con- 
strain us  to  entertain  a  sense  of  dependence.  Were  nature  irregu- 
lar throughout,  man  would  live  in  a  state  of  constant  fear  and 
bewilderment ;  were  it  uniform  throughout,  he  would  be  tempted 
to  haughtiness  and  presumption.  By  the  one  class  of  arrange- 
ments man  is  made  to  feel  security,  and  is  prompted  to  that  in- 
dustry to  which  security  gives  scope ;  by  the  other,  he  is  con- 
strained to  feel  that  he  needs  the  blessing  of  heaven,  and  led  to 
pour  out  his  soul  to  God  in  humble  supplications.  In  the  one  we 
see  how  all  is  arranged  for  our  good,  and  in  the  other  we  discover 


ACCOMPLISHMENT    OF    THE    DIVINE    PURPOSES.  187 

that  we  are  as  dependent  on  God  as  if  nothing  had  been  lixed  or 
determined  ;  and  so  the  one  disposes  us  to  praise,  and  the  other  to 
prayer.  It  is  by  the  admirable  union  and  blending  of  the  two  that 
man  is  encouraged  to  cherish  a  grateful  confidence,  and  act  upon 
it,  while  at  the  same  time  he  is  obliged  to  entertain  a  feeling  of 
dependence,  and  humble  himself  before  a  higher  power.  Let  it 
be  added,  that  while  the  one  shows  how  God  would  allure  us  to 
put  confidence  in  himself,  the  other  proves  that  he  puts  no  confi- 
dence in  us  ;  and  thus  while  the  one  should  incite  to  gratitude  and 
love,  the  other  should  awe  us  into  reverence  and  humility. 

Nor  is  it  a  less  beautiful  provision  of  God  that  the  uniformity 
and  the  contingency  are  alike  under  the  direct  control  of  God,  by 
their  both  following  from  causes  which  he  hath  put  in  operation. 
The  contingency  has  a  respect  to  man  and  not  to  God,  with 
whom  it  is  certainty.  Even  in  regard  to  the  fortuities  of  life, 
men  can  cherish  the  confidence  that  they  are  under  the  control 
of  infinite  wisdom  and  goodness.  They  may  seem  light  as  gases 
or  floating  vapors  ;  but  like  them,  wherever  they  go,  they  are 
under  central  attraction,  which  keeps  them  in  their  places  as 
necessary  parts  and  agents  of  the  system. 

We  have  said  that  we  are  not  jealous  of  the  discovery  of  law 
in  the  government  of  God ;  but  we  have  said  so,  because  we 
have  marked  how  the  law  operates.  We  would  most  certainly 
be  as  jealous  of  law  as  any  man  can  be,  if  it  acted  as  some  repre- 
sent it — we  would  be  as  as  jealous  of  it  as  of  mere  brute  force 
under  no  control.  We  are  not  jealous  of  the  introduction  and 
widest  extension  of  general  laws,  for  we  discover  in  their  harmo- 
nious adjustment  a  remedy  against  the  evils  to  which,  if  acting 
separately  and  independently,  they  would  most  inevitably  lead. 
While  these  fixed  laws  give  to  Providence  its  firmness,  the  im- 
mense number  and  nice  adaptations  of  these  laws,  like  the  innu- 
merable rings  of  a  coat  of  mail,  give  to  it  its  flexibility,  whereby  it 
fits  in  to  the  shape  and  posture  of  the  individual. 

It  is  by  the  two-fold  operation  of  these  two  grand  powers  that 
society  is  made  to  move  forward.  The  one  gives  to  society  its 
statical,  and  the  other  its  dynamical  power.  The  uniform  laws 
are  like  the  orderly  strata  produced  in  the  ancient  geological  world 
throughout  long  ages,  and  by  the  peaceful  agency  of  water.  The 
contingencies,  again,  may  be  compared  to  those  upheavals  which 
have  been  produced  by  boiling  igneous  matter  pouring  itself  from 
the  bowels  of  the  earth,  and  raising  the  sediment  of  the  ocean  to 


188  VARIED    MEANS    FOR    THE 

become  the  peaks  of  the  highest  mountains.  It  seems  as  if  soci- 
ety at  large  required,  as  do  also  individual  men,  the  agency  of 
both  elements.  Without  the  one  all  would  be  bare  and  rugged, 
and  without  the  other  all  would  be  flat  and  tame.  The  result  of 
both  is  existing  society,  with  its  high  elevations  towering  over 
and  sheltering  its  sequestered  vales.  The  one,  to  vary  our  illus- 
tration, is  the  conservative,  and  the  other  the  reforming  principle 
in  the  constitution  of  the  world.  The  one  gives  to  it  its  equality 
and  peace,  and  the  other  keeps  it  from  stagnating  and  breeding 
corruption.  The  one  is  the  centripetal,  and  the  other  the  centri- 
fugal force  ;  and  it  is  by  their  nice  adjustment  that  the  world 
moves  along  in  its  allotted  sphere. 

And  let  us  mark  how  many  of  the  great  changes,  which  have 
given  life  to  society,  have  arisen  not  so  much  from  the  orderly 
and  anticipated  successions  of  events  as  from  those  that  are  un- 
expected and  fortuitous.  All  great  living  movements  have  arisen, 
as  large  rivers  rise,  in  the  midst  of  ruggedness.  No  doubt  there 
must  have  been  antecedent  predisposing  and  heaven-appointed 
causes,  just  as  the  rains  of  heaven  supply  the  materials,  and  the 
interior  of  the  mountains  the  channels,  for  the  waters  that  gush 
out  in  the  springs  among  the  hills.  But  in  themselves  they  have 
leapt  at  once  into  existence,  and  dashed  along  into  impetuous  tor- 
rents. The  opposition  offered  has  lashed  them  into  turbulence, 
but  has  not  been  able  to  stem  their  progress — nay,  it  may  only 
be  the  means  of  imparting  to  them  a  greater  or  more  irresistible 
rapidity.  Of  this  description  have  been  almost  all  the  great 
movements  for  good — religious,  political,  or  social,  which  have 
stirred  society.  As  these  streams  make  progress,  all  opposition 
vanishes  in  the  sense  of  the  utter  hopelessness  of  the  effort  to  op- 
pose them,  and  they  at  length  sweep  along  amidst  wide-spread 
fertility  which  they  enrich  and  adorn — would  we  had  not  to  add, 
often  without  the  purity  and  energy  which  once  they  had,  and  at 
last  to  lose  all  separate  existence  as  they  expand  themselves,  and 
are  lost,  among  other  influences,  as  in  a  great  circumambient 
ocean. 

It  is  also  curious  to  observe  how,  by  an  exquisitely  balanced 
system  of  counterpoises,  these  two  elements  are  rendered  much 
the  same  in  all  ages  of  the  world,  at  all  stages  of  society,  and 
in  all  grades  of  life.  In  the  simpler  states  of  society,  as  in  the 
shepherd  life,  and  among  the  lower  and  uneducated  classes,  there 
is  less  observation  of  the  constancy  of  nature  ;  but  there  is,  at  the 


ACCOMPLISHMENT    OF    THE    DIVINE    PURPOSES.  189 

same  time,  less  exposure  to  sudden  reverses,  and  the  other  changes 
produced  by  the  complication  of  human  relations.  As  society  ad- 
vances in  civilization,  and  men's  views  become  more  expanded, 
they  observe  more  of  the  regularity  of  law,  and  acquire  a  greater 
power  over  the  refractory  agents  of  nature  ;  but  in  the  same  pro- 
portion their  points  of  contact  with  other  and  distant  objects  are 
multiplied,  and  as  they  become  more  independent  in  one  respect 
they  become  more  dependent  in  others.  The  elevated  classes  of 
society  have,  no  doubt,  a  larger  prospect,  but  they  are  exposed  to 
more  dreadful  storms  than  those  who  dwell  in  the  quieter  vales 
of  human  life ;  and  when  driven  from  their  height,  their  fall  is 
the  greater  ;  and  owing  to  the  refinement  of  their  minds,  they  feel 
it  with  infinitely  greater  acuteness.  The  event  which  the  peasant 
regards  as  isolated  and  refers  to  special  miracle,  is  observed  by  the 
man  of  enlarged  education  to  be  one  of  a  class,  and  connected 
with  others  happening  in  other  parts  of  the  world  ;  but  in  the 
very  circumstances  which  have  led  the  latter  to  make  this  obser- 
vation, he  has  enlarged  the  number  of  his  connections,  and  be- 
come dependent  on  objects  which  cannot,  by  any  possibility,  reach 
or  touch  the  other.  The  express  which  brings  to  the  man  of 
reading  and  intelligence  the  notice  of  an  earthquake  which  has 
visited  some  distant  country,  and  by  which  he  explains  some  par- 
tial shock  felt  near  his  dwelling,  that  so  roused  the  superstitious 
fear  of  the  cottager,  also  informs  him  of  the  failure  of  a  crop  in 
that  particular  country,  to  the  great  detriment  of  his  trade,  or  an- 
nounces the  painful  intelligence  of  the  decease  of  a  beloved  son 
for  whose  welfare  he  has  been  toiling. 

There  are  proud  enthusiasts  who  conclude  that,  by  advancing 
in  knowledge  and  the  useful  arts,  man  will  soon  be  able  to  com- 
mand nature,  and  become  independent  of  it.  It  is  singular  to 
observe  how  every  mind  paints  a  golden  age  for  the  future  desti- 
nies of  our  world,  and  each  mind  colors  that  age  with  its  own 
hues.  The  golden  age  of  the  philosopher  is  an  anticipated  period, 
in  which  man  will  be  able  to  control  all  and  yet  be  controlled  of 
none.  But  the  philosopher  forgets  one  most  important  element  in 
his  calculation — and  that  is,  that  in  very  proportion  as  society 
becomes  more  artificial,  it  becomes  more  reticulated,  and  the  des- 
tinies of  every  one  portion  more  connected  with  those  of  every 
other,  and  that  the  snapping  of  one  link  in  this  network  may 
throw  the  whole  into  inextricable  confusion. 

In  short,  both  the  regular  and  the  contingent  pervade  nature, 


190  VARIED    MEANS    FOR    THE 

and  we  cannot  free  ourselves  from  the  one  or  the  other  ;  and 
man,  whether  in  his  lesser  or  wider  spheres,  whether  in  the  ruder 
or  more  civilized  states  of  society,  is  made  to  fall  in  with  very 
much  the  same  proportion  of  both. 

Now,  this  is  the  true  pre-established  harmony  of  which  Leibnitz 
had  but  an  imperfect  glimpse.  He  discovered  the  wonderful  adap- 
tation of  every  one  event  to  every  other  by  arrangements  settled 
at  the  original  creation  and  constitution  of  the  world ;  and  per- 
ceived that  circumstances,  which  have  no  connection  in  the  way 
of  cause  and  effect,  were  closely  connected  through  the  Divine 
appointment.  So  far  his  theory  has  a  foundation  which  can 
never  be  moved ;  but  he  carried  it  out  too  far,  and  applied  it  to 
relations  which  are  truly  causal  in  their  nature.  His  error,  as  it 
appears  to  us,  arose  from  a  confused  and,  so  far,  a  mistaken  idea 
of  the  true  relation  between  cause  and  effect — a  subject  involved 
in  the  age  of  Leibnitz  in  great  perplexities.  "  He  could  not  hold 
that  mind  changes  the  laws  of  matter,  or  that  matter  could 
change  the  laws  of  mind."*  This  fundamental  error  (which 
connected  itself  with  his  monadical  or  dynamical  theory)  led  him 
into  several  mistakes.  For  it  is  surely  conceivable  that  God,  by 
his  infinite  power,  can  make  a  casual  connection  between  mind 
and  matter,  just  as  he  has  instituted  a  casual  connection  between 
one  portion  of  matter  and  another,  and  observation  brings  such  a 
connection  under  our  notice  continually.  Keeping  out  of  view 
the  errors  originating  in  this  mistaken  opinion,  Leibnitz's  theory 
of  pre-established  harmony  has  always  appeared  to  us  to  be  as 
just  as  it  is  beautiful,  and  to  be  far  in  advance  of  those  mechani- 
cal views  which  have  prevailed  among  the  minute  philosophers 
of  later  ages. 

By  means  of  this  pre-established  harmony  God  can  accomplish 
not  onlyhis  general  but  his  individual  purposes,  and  at  the  time 
and  in  the  way  intended  by  him.  As  entertaining  this  view  of 
the  perfection  of  the  original  constitution  of  all  things,  we  see  no 
advantage  in  calling  in  special  interpositions  of  God  acting  with- 
out physical  causes — always  excepting  the  miracles  employed  to 
attest  Divine  revelation.  But  speaking  of  the  ordinary  providence 
of  God,  we  believe  that  the  fitting  of  the  various  parts  of  the  ma- 
chinery is  so  nice  that  there  is  no  need  of  any  interference  with 
it.  We  believe  in  an  original  disposition  of  all  things ;  we  be- 
lieve that  in  this  disposition  there  is  provided  an  interposition  of 
*  Discourse  on  the  Conformity  of  Faith  and  Reason, 


ACCOMPLISHMENT    OF    THE    DIVINE    PURPOSES.  191 

one  thing  in  reference  to  another,  so  as  to  produce  the  individual 
effect  which  God  contemplates  ;  but  we  are  not  required  by  phi- 
losophy or  religion  to  acknowledge  that  there  is  subsequent  inter- 
position by  God  with  the  original  dispositions  and  interpositions 
which  he  hath  instituted.  "  This  is,  in  fact,  the  great  miracle 
of  Providence,  that  no  miracles  are  needed  to  accomplish  its  pur- 
poses." * 

"  God,"  says  Leibnitz,  "  has  provided  everything,  he  has  reme- 
died everything  beforehand.  There  is  in  his  works  a  harmony,  a 
beauty  already  pre-established.  The  opinion  does  not  at  all  ex- 
clude the  providence  or  the  government  of  God.  A  true  provi- 
dence on  the  part  of  God  demands  a  perfect  foreknowledge,  but  it 
demands  not  only  that  he  has  foreseen  everything,  but  also  that 
he  has  provided  for  everything — otherwise  he  is  deficient  either 
of  the  wisdom  to  foresee,  or  the  power  to  provide."  Samuel 
Clarke,  in  a  controversy  which  he  carried  on  with  Leibnitz,  urges 
that  this  view  does  not  render  the  universe  dependent  on  God,  anc1 
so  he  argues  that  God  interposes  from  time  to  time  to  set  his 
works  right.  To  this  Leibnitz  replies  : — "  That  defect  of  our  ma- 
chines, which  renders  them  in  need  of  repair,  arises  from  the  cir 
cumstance  that  they  are  not  sufficiently  dependent  on  the  work- 
man. Thus  the  dependence  of  nature  .upon  God,  so  far  from 
being  the  cause  of  this  defect,  is  rather  the  cause  why  the  defec* 
does  not  exist,  because  it  is  dependent  on  a  workman  too  perfect 
to  make  a  work  which  needs  to  be  repaired."  t 

We  see  no  advantage  to  be  gained  to  religion  by  insisting  that 
certain  events  in  the  common  providence  of  God  can  have  no 
second  cause.  Bacon,  speaking  on  this  subject,  says — "  For 
certain  it  is  that  God  worketh  nothing  in  nature  but  by  second 
causes  ;  and  if  they  would  have  it  otherwise  believed,  it  is  mere 
imposture,  as  it  were,  in  favor  towards  God,  and  nothing  else  but 
to  offer  to  the  author  of  truth  the  unclean  sacrifice  of  a  lie.  But 
farther,  it  is  an  assured  truth,  and  a  conclusion  of  experience,  that 
a  little  or  superficial  knowledge  of  philosophy  may  incline  the 
man  to  atheism,  but  a  farther  proceeding  therein  doth  bring  the 
rnind  back  again  to  religion ;  for  in  the  entrance  of  philosophy, 
when  the  second  causes  which  are  next  unto  the  senses  do  offer 
themselves  to  the  mind  of  man,  if  it  dwell  and  stay  there,  it  may 
induce  some  oblivion  of  the  highest  cause  ;  but  when  a  man 

*  Taylor's  Nat.  Hist,  of  Enthusiasm. 

f  See  Letters  between  Leibnitz  and  Clarke. 


192  ACCOMPLISHMENT    OF    THE    DIVINE    PURPOSES. 

eth  on  farther,  and  seeth  the  dependence  ot  causes  and  the  works 
of  Providence,  then,  according  to  the  allegory  of  the  poets,  he  will 
easily  believe  that  the  highest  link  of  nature's  chain  must  needs 
be  tied  to  the  foot  of  Jupiter's  chair."  * 

There  are  some  judicious  remarks  on  this  subject  in  Tucker's 
Light  of  Nature.f  "  Therefore,  let  not  men  condemn  one  another 
too  hastily  of  impiety  or  superstition,  for  both  are  relative  to  the 
strength  of  each  person's  sight.  The  philosopher  may  entertain 
so  high  an  opinion  of  infinite  wisdom,  as  that  upon  the  formation 
of  a  world  it  might  provide  for  every  event  that  is  to  happen  du- 
ring the  whole  period  of  its  continuance ;  therefore,  he  is  not 
impious  in  asserting  that  all  things  since  have  gone  on  in  the 
course  of  natural  causes,  for  his  idea  of  the  first  plan  is  so  full  as 
to  leave  no  room  for  anything  to  be  interposed.  This  the  plain 
man  cannot  comprehend,  the  lines  of  his  view  being  short,  there- 
fore he  is  not  superstitious  in  imagining  frequent  interpositions,  be- 
cause without  them  he  cannot  understand  a  Providence  at  all 
He  may  likewise  find  it  impossible  to  conceive  that  every  motion 
of  matter  and  turn  of  volition  should  be  calculated  or  foreseen ; 
but  supposes  a  watchful  Providence  continually  attentive  to  the 
tendency  of  second  causes,  interposing  every  hour  and  day  to  cor- 
rect the  errors  of  chance,  and  secretly  turning  the  springs  of  action 
the  way  that  wisdom  and  goodness  recommend.  And  he  is  excus- 
able therein,  if  this  be  the  best  conception  he  can  form,  for  it  dero- 
gates not  from  his  idea  of  the  Divine  wisdom  and  dominion  to 
imagine  that  there  should  be  room  left  in  nature  for  chance,  so 
long  as  there  is  a  superintending  power  who  can  foresee  the 
irregularities  of  chance,  time  enough  to  prevent  them.  Thus  how 
largely  soever  we  may  ascribe  to  interposition,  or  how  much  soever 
deduct  therefrom  to  add  to  the  disposing  Providence,  we  cannot 
deny  that  every  natural  cause  we  see  is  an  effect  of  some  prior 
cause,  impulse  of  impulse,  and  volition  of  motives  and  ideas 
suggested  to  the  mind,  therefore  must  refer  all  dispensations  ulti 
mately  to  the  act  of  God  ;  and  as  we  cannot  imagine  him  to  act 
without  knowing  what  he  does,  and  what  will  result  therefrom, 
we  must  conclude  that  act  to  proceed  upon  a  plan  and  disposition 
of  the  causes,  tending  to  produce  the  particular  consequences  fol- 
lowing thereupon.  The  only  difference  between  the  man  of  com- 
mon sense  and  the  studious  is  concerning  the  time  when  the  dis- 

*  De  Aug.  Scien.  f  Chap,  on  Providence. 


ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE.  193 

position  was  made,  which  the  one  thinks  a  few  days  or  a  few 
minutes,  the  other  many  ages  ago,  the  one  frequent  and  occasional, 
the  other  rare  and  universal ;  but  both  acknowledge  that  nothing 
ever  happens  without  the  permission  of  one  Almighty  and  ever 
vigilant  Governor." 

ILLUSTRATIVE  NOTE  (D).— COMBE'S  CONSTITUTION  OF  MAN. 

This  work  has  had  so  extensive  a  circulation  in  this  country' 
and  in  America,  that  it  demands  a  passing  notice.  It  is  a  congel- 
ation, and  all  by  natural  law,  of  a  cold  and  secular  age.  which  it 
has  by  reaction  rendered  still  more  frigid.  In  examining  it,  we 
will  not  enter  upon  the»consideration  of  the  phrenology  which  the 
author  has  used  to  explain  his  theory,  for,  as  he  remarks  himself, 
the  practical  value  of  the  views  which  he  unfolds  does  not  depend 
on  phrenology  ;  and  he  intimates  that  the  same  views  could  be 
expounded,  though  not  so  effectually,  upon  another  system. 

We  are  quite  willing  to  admit  that  there  are  some  important  truths 
set  forth  in  this  treatise.  This  world  is  governed  by  what  he  calls 
natural,  organic,  and  moral  laws.  The  classification  is  perhaps 
not  very  philosophically  worded — for  surely  organic  laws  are  also 
natural  laws ;  and  when  we  speak  of  moral  laws  we  should  re- 
member that  they  are  totally  different  from  physical  laws.  But 
disregarding  this,  we  do  reckon  it  as  of  some  importance,  that 
mankind  should  be  reminded  that  this  world  is  governed  by  laws, 
and  .that  it  is  their  duty  to  study  these  laws,  and  accommodate 
themselves  to  them.  His  book,  we  doubt  not,  is  so  far  fitted  to 
make  men  observant  and  prudent,  and  may  have  checked,  in  some 
cases,  that  rashness  among  the  young,  and  over-exertion  among 
the  eager  and  ambitious,  which  has  produced  such  fatal  effects. 
In  short,  he  has  given  a  prominence  to  certain  points  which  com- 
mon sense  and  common  prudence  were  ever  observing,  and  not 
unfrequently  magnifying  far  beyond  their  real  importance,  bu^ 
which  religion  and  enthusiasm  were  sometimes  tempted  to  over- 
look in  an  eagerness  to  attain  their  glorious  ends. 

He  has  also  pointed  out  several  important  and  deeply  interest- 
ing relations  between  the  constitution  of  the  world  and  the  consti- 
tution of  man. 

We  know  not  that  there  any  persons  who  deny  these  truths, 
that  law  prevails  in  the  world,  and  that  these  laws  are  in  harmony. 
Still,  they  may  have  been  overlooked  in  some  cases,  and  it  is  of 

13 


194  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

some  moment  that  they  should  stand  out  distinctly  to  the  view. 
We  feel  now,  however,  as  if  we  had  exhausted  all  the  praise 
which  can  be  bestowed  upon  this  treatise,  the  actual  truth  set 
forth  in  which  has  been  used  as  a  means  of  administering  of  poison. 
He  carries  out  his  very  limited  and  partial  views  as  if  they  were 
the  whole  truth,  and  has  committed  several  inexcusable  errors, 
and  drawn  conclusions  which  would  go  far  to  sap  the  foundations 
of  a  living  religion.  Let  us  notice  some  of  the  more  glaring  defects 
of  the  work. 

First,  all  but  phrenologists  will  doubt  whether  he  has  given  a 
correct  enumeration  of-  those  laws  which  men  are  required  to  ob- 
serve, and  even  the  higher  class  of  prenologists  will  reckon  the 
laws  which  he  so  magnifies  as  truly  not  the  most  important,  and 
as  not  having  had  their  proper  relative  importance  attached  to 
them. 

Secondly,  he  has  completely  overlooked  the  ambiguity  which 
lurks  in  the  word  law,  and  used  it  in  all  the  divers  senses  of  which 
it  is  capable,  and  has  unconsciously  passed  from  the  one  to  the 
other,  predicating  of  a  law  in  one  sense  what  is  true  of  it  only  in 
another.  Sometimes  he  means  by  it  a  property  of  matter,  some- 
times a  cause  requiring  the  adjustment  cf  two  or  more  substances 
to  each  other;  at  other  times  a  general  fact  originating  in  the 
adjustment  of  causes,  and  anon  he  denotes  by  it  a  moral  precept 
enjoined  by  God.  With  the  greatest  coolness  and  self-compla- 
cency, he  uses  the  word  law  in  all  these  senses  without  ever 
dreaming  that  there  is  any  difference  between  them,  constantly 
asserting  of  a  general  fact  what  is  true  only  of  a  property  of  mat- 
ter, and  of  a  physical  cause  what  holds  good  only  of  a  moral 
precept. 

Thirdly — and  this  is  his  most  inexcusable  oversight — he  over- 
looks altogether  that  adjustment  of  natural  laws  to  each  other, 
whereby  the  results  are  often  of  the  most  complicated  character, 
and  such  that  they  cannot  be  anticipated  by  human  foresight. 
While  all  events  are  occurring,  according  to  the  law  of  cause  and 
effect,  they  are  not  happening  in  that  orderly  and  regular  manner 
which  we  call  a  general  law.  On  the  contrary,  many  events  are 
falling  out  in  an  accidental  unforeseen  manner,  and  in  a  way 
which  is  fitted  to  render  man  altogether  helpless.  The  author  in 
disregarding  this  circumstance,  this  complication  of  the  arrange- 
ments of  Providence,  and  the  consequent  dependence  of  man,  has 
overlooked  a  principle  in  the  Divine  government  as  important  as 


COMBE'S  CONSTITUTION  OP  MAN.  195 

method  of  general  laws  on  which  his  attention  has  been  ex- 
clusively fixed. 

Fourthly,  and  as  following  from  the  oversight  last  mentioned, 
he  has  neglected  to  observe  that  men  are  as  dependent  on  the  ar- 
rangements of  Providence  as  they  are  on  natural  and  organic 
laws.  Hence  the  efficacy  of  prayer  is  boldly  denied,  and  no  en- 
couragement given  to  faith,  to  a  sense  of  dependence  and  other 
graces,  such  as  faith,  submission,  meekness,  and  patience,  so 
strongly  recommended  by  religion  under  all  its  beneficent  forms, 
and  so  becoming  on  the  part  of  man  in  the  state  in  which  he 
finds  himself. 

Fifthly,  he  robs  the  sufferer  of  everything  fitted  to  impart  true 
consolation.  A  poor  widow  has  her  house  burned,  or  has  lost  her 
husband  in  consequence  of  the  shipwreck  of  his  vessel,  and  all 
the  consolation  that  the  writer  has  to  offer  is,  that  it  is  a  good 
thing  that  fire  burns  and  that  winds  blow.  He  comes  to  her  and 
says,  "  would  you  tiave  fire  not  to  burn  ?  then  remember  if  it  does 
not  burn  it  cannot  warm  you."  "Would  you  have  winds  not  to 
blow  ?  then  bear  in  mind  that  the  air  will  become  so  stagnant 
that  you  cannot  breathe  it."  Whatever  the  prudent  and  worldly 
may  say  to  such  a  system,  when  his  plans  are  all  prospering,  and 
lie  is  hymning  an  anthem  of  praise  to  his  own  wisdom,  the  sufferer 
feels  that  he  needs  to  be  told  of  an  overruling  Providence,  which 
has  appointed  that  particular  event  for  good,  and  of  a  living  God 
who  feels  for  the  sorrows  to  which  his  creatures  are  exposed. 

Sixthly,  he  anticipates  to  individuals  and  communities  an  un- 
reasonable extent  of  benefit,  to  be  secured  by  the  mere  observa- 
tion of  general  laws.  It  is  amusing  to  notice  the  wrath  (all  cool 
though  he  usually  be)  into  which  he  works  himself,  when  blaming 
mankind  for  not  observing  these  laws,  and  the  constant  predictions 
which  he  is  uttering  about  the  world  exhibiting  an  elysian  perfec- 
tion, when  mankind  shall  have  become  so  wise  as  to  allow  phren- 
ology to  instruct  them.  Surely  there  must  be  something  wrong  in 
human  nature  when  mankind  have  so  neglected  these  laws  for 
1)000  years,  is  the  reflection  which  rises  up  in  our  minds  on  read- 
ing his  language  ;  and  is  there  not  a  risk,  we  are  inclined  to  whis- 
per in  his  ear,  that  this  evil  nature  abide  with  us  in  time  to  come, 
and  disappoint  some  of  Combe's  brightest  expectations  ?  Is  there 
not  a  risk,  too,  that  if  men  by  natural  laws  could  do  all  which 
Combe  supposes,  they  would  be  tempted  to  abuse  their  power  ? 
The  wise  will  rejoice  that  there  is  such  a  system  of  checks  in  the 


196     ON  A  GENERAL  AND  PARTICULAR  PROVIDENCE, 

providence  of  God,  that  man  is  often  rendered  helpless,  and  is  at 
all  times  dependent;  for  they  see  that  such  is  the  selfishness  of 
men,  and  such  the  power  of  their  lower  propensities,  that  if  they 
could  do  more  by  natural  laws,  the  evils  which  abound  in  society 
would  be  fearfully  increased.  We,  too,  look  for  the  dawn  of  a 
brighter  era  in  our  earth's  history  ;  but  we  look  for  it  to  the  provi- 
dence of  God,  and  the  transforming  power  of  his  Spirit. 

These  objections  to  his  views  of  natural  and  organic  laws  are 
altogether  independent  of  those  which  might  be  brought  against 
his  theory  of  "  moral  law,"  the  examination  of  which  would  cause 
us  to  anticipate  the  ethical  inquiries  to  be  afterwards  instituted, 
It  is  the  less  needful  to  examine  his  moral  theory,  from  the  circum- 
stance that  there  is  nothing  in  it  different  from  other  meagre 
ethical  systems,  except  it  be,  that  he  so  often  classes  "moral"  with 
"natural"  law,  and  confounds  things  which  the  mere  tyro  in 
science  has  been  taught  to  separate. 

We  have  so  far  noticed  this  treatise,  because  there  is  an  air  of 
extraordinary  wisdom  about  it,  which  has  made  many  to  regard 
it  as  superlatively  profound.  The  author  has  seen  and  endeavored 
to  count  the  nice  wheels  of  the  machine,  but  has  overlooked 
their  relation  to  one  another,  and  the  moving  power  by  which  they 
have  been  set  in  motion.  His  views  are  about  as  profound  as 
those  of  a  factory  girl,  explaining  with  looks  of  mysterious  wisdom, 
to  her  companion  who  has  just  entered  the  work,  the  movements 
of  some  of  the  straps  or  wheels,  telling  her  how  to  use  them,  and 
pointing  out  the  danger  of  not  attending  to  them.  The  informa- 
tion is  all  very  good  and  useful,  provided  always  that  it  be  not 
hinted,  that  in  knowing  the  motion  of  these  few  wheels,  we  know 
all  about  the  machine  and  its  method  of  operation. 

SECTION  III.— ON  A  GENERAL  AND  PARTICULAR  PROVIDENCE. 

There  have  been  disputes  among  thinking  minds  in  alt  ages,  as 
to  whether  the  providence  of  God  is  general  or  particular.  Phil- 
osophers, so  called,  have  generally  taken  the  former  view,  and 
Divines  the  latter.  These  two  parties  have  contended  with  each 
other  as  fiercely  as  if  there  had  been  a  real  inconsistency  between 
their  views.  The  general  providence  of  God,  properly  understood, 
reaches  to  the  most  particular  and  minute  objects  and  events;  and 
the  particular  providence  of  God  becomes  general  by  its  embrac- 
ing every  particular. 


ON    A    GENERAL    AND    PARTICULAR    PROVIDENCE.  197 

Those  who  suppose  that  there  is  a  general,  but  that  there  cannot 
be  a  particular  providence,  are  limiting1  God  by  ideas  derived  from 
human  weakness.  The  greatest  of  human  minds,  in  contemplat- 
ing important  ends,  are  obliged  to  overlook  many  minor  events 
falling  out  incidentally  as  they  proceed  with  their  plans.  The 
legislator,  for  instance,  is  sometimes  under  the  necessity  of  disre- 
garding the  temporary  misery,  which  the  changes  introduced  by 
him,  and  which  are  advantageous  as  a  whole,  may  bring  along 
with  them.  In  short,  in  attending  to  the  general,  man  must  often 
overlook  the  particular.  But  we  are  not  to  suppose  that  an  in- 
finite God,  infinite  in  his  power,  his  wisdom,  and  resources,  and 
present  through  all  his  works,  is  laid  under  any  such  inability  to 
attend  to  particular  events,  because  he  is  also  superintending  em- 
pires and  worlds.  The  pains,  if  we  may  so  speak,  which  God  has 
taken  to  beautify  every  leaf  and  flower — nay,  every  weed  that  we 
trample  under  foot,  the  new  beauties  unseen  by  the  naked  eye, 
which  the  microscope  discloses  in  the  vegetable  kingdoms,  and  the 
beautiful  organization  of  the  insect  world — all  show  that  the  great- 
ness of  God  is  peculiarly  seen  in  the  care  which  he  takes  of  objects 
the  most  minute. 

On  the  other  hand,  they  take  a  most  unworthy  view  of  the 
divine  character,  who  conclude  that  his  attention  is  exclusively 
directed  to  a  few  favorite  objects,  in  which  they  themselves  possibly 
feel  a  special  interest.  Here,  again,  we  discover  the  tendency  of 
mankind  to  measure  God  by  standards  derived  from  human  in- 
firmity. It  not  unfrequently  happens  that  the  minute  man,  who 
manages  with  care  and  kindness  his  own  affairs,  and  those  of  his 
family,  has  no  very  enlarged  views  or  feelings  of  general  philan- 
thropy. Taking  such  a  model  as  this,  there  are  piously-disposed 
minds  who  would  make  God  "  altogether  such  an  one  as  them- 
selves ;"  and  conceiving  it  to  be  impossible  for  him,  in  the  atten- 
tion which  he  must  pay  to  certain  objects,  to  provide  for  the  wants 
of  all  his  creatures,  they  would  praise  him,  because,  in  the  exer- 
cise of  what  would  truly  be  a  weak  favoritism,  he  is  supposed 
to  pass  by,  and  disregard  the  whole  world  in  the  extraordinary 
•care  which  he  takes  of  persons  who  are  the  special  objects  of  his 
.regards. 

In  the  government  of  this  world,  the  individual  is  not  lost  in  the 
general  on  the  one  hand,  nor  is  the  general  neglected  in  the 
attention  to  the  individual  on  the  other  hand.  No  creature,  no 
object  however  significant,  has  been  overlooked.  The  general 


198          ON    A    GENERAL    AND    PARTICULAR    PROVIDENCE 

includes  every  individual  which  finds  accordingly  its  appropriate 
place.  Provision  has  been  made  for  all  and  for  each  in  the  grand 
system  of  the  universe. 

The  particular  method  which  God  employs  in  accomplishing 
these  ends,  apparently  inconsistent,  has  already  been  pointed  ouU 
It  is  not  so  much  by  means  of  those  general  laws  on  which  the 
minds  of  the  votaries  of  science  are  prone  to  dwell,  as  by  the  all- 
wise  and  skilful  combination  of  these  laws  for  the  production  of 
the  particular  ends  which  God  designs.  Philosophers  have  looked 
too  exclusively  to  these  general  laws ;  and  in  doing  sor  have  been 
able  to  detect  few  traces  of  a  special  providence.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  man  whose  heart  impels  him  to  observe  the  ways  of  his 
Creator,  has  ever  fondly  dwelt  on  those  cross  arrangements,  many 
of  them  apparently  accidental,  by  which  God  makes  provision  for 
the  wants  of  his  creatures,  and  nicely  adapts  his  dispensations  to 
their  state  and  character. 

Living  as  we  do  under  such  a  system,  we  are  not  at  liberty  to 
draw  distinctions,  and  to  represent  God  as  taking  charge  of  and 
ordaining  some  events,  but  not  other  events  or  all  events.  No 
such  distinction  should  be  drawn ;  no  such  distinction  can  be 
drawn.  As  we  make  the  attempt,  we  find  that  no  line  can  be 
drawn  which  will  divide  the  two  territories  which  we  would 
separate. 

Balbus,  the  Stoic,  in  Cicero  de  Natura  Deorum,  quoting  from, 
or  referring  to?  a  line  in  Euripides,  says,  "  Magna  dii  curant  parva 
negligunt,"  and  adds,  "  Magnis  autem  viris  prospere  semper  omnes 
res."  But  every  one  sees  that  the  difference  between  great  and 
small,  is  but  a  difference  of  degree  of  comparison;  and  no  one  can 
point  out  the  place  where  the  one  ends  and  the  other  begins,  or 
arrange  actual  events  under  so  loose  a  classification.  Every  one- 
knows,  too,  that,  great  events  often  depend  on  events  which  are  in 
themselves  insignificant ;  and  if  small  events  were  above  or  beneath 
God's  control,  great  events  would  soon  get  beyond  his  dominion. 

Justin  Martyr,  speaking  of  the  philosophers  of  his  time,  remarks- 
— "  They  rather  seek  to  convince  us  that  the  divinity  extends  his 
care  to  the  great  whole,  and  the  several  kinds  ;  but  not  to  me  and 
lo  you,  and  to  men  as  individuals.  Hence  it  is  useless  to  pray  to 
him,  for  everything  occurs  according  to  the  unchangeable  laws  of 
an  endless  cycle."  But  as  the  genus  is  made  up  of  the  individ- 
uals that  compose  it,  God  can  take  charge  of  the  genus,  merely 
by  taking  charge  of  the  individuals.  We  have  already  pointed 


ON    A    GENERAL    AND    PARTICULAR    PROVIDENCE.  199 

out  the  way  (and  mean  to  resume  the  subject  in  a  future  section) 
by  which  unchangeable  laws  can  be  made  to  procure  individual 
results. 

In  modern  times,  many  attempts  have  been  made  to  draw  the 
line  of  distinction,  but  always  in  the  very  loosest  manner.  It  is 
said  we  can  discover  God  in  those  events  that  have  a  cause,  but 
not  in  those  that  have  no  cause  ?  The  answer  is  at  hand,  in  the 
fact  now  acknowledged,  that  every  event  has  a  cause.  Or  is  it 
rather  hinted  that  the  distinction  lies  in  this,  that  the  cause  of 
the  one  event  is  known,  and  of  the  other  unknown  ?  This  view 
lands  us  in  the  absurdity  of  making  men's  knowledge,  which  varies 
in  the  case  of  individuals  and  ages  in  the  world's  history,  the 
measure  or  test  of  the  presence  of  deity.  Some,  again,  would  ex-  . 
elude  God  wherever  a  general  law  or  a  second  cause  can  be 
detected — forgetting  that  these  laws  or  causes  are  ordained  by 
God,  and  the  special  expression  of  his  will.  Others  would  confine 
his  intentions  to  the  immediate  results  of  general  laws,  and  ex- 
clude him  from  those  apparent  fortuities  which  result  from  the 
concurrence  or  collision  of  the  general  properties  of  matter ;  but  in 
doing  so,  they  forget  that  individual  incidents,  as  well  as  general 
phenomena,  proceed  from  the  powers  of  nature  which  God  hath 
put  in  operation,  and  from  the  adjustments  which  he  hath  insti- 
tuted. It  is  quite  impossible  to  draw  such  a  distinction  as  would 
admit  the  presence  of  God  in  certain  effects  which  flow  more  di- 
rectly from  general  laws,  and  exclude  him  from  other  events  that 
follow  as  certainly,  though  it  may  be  in  a  more  indirect  and  de- 
vious manner,  from  the  very  same  laws.  We  cannot  say  of  any 
one  event,  this  is  the  mere  scaffolding,  and  this  other  the  building 
— for  the  very  scaffolding  is  part  of  the  building.  The  means  is 
an  end  in  God's  works;  and  the  end  is  a  means  to  something  far- 
ther. In  short,  we  cannot  draw  distinctions  which  do  not  exist  in 
nature.  Every  trial  that  is  made  will  show  that  the  attempt  is 
vain.  The  inevitable  practical  result  of  drawing  such  a  distinc- 
tion is  manifest.  Mankind  would  ascribe  to  God  only  what  they 
pleased ;  and  this  would  turn  out  to  be  what  suited  their  humor ; 
and  they  would  ascribe  to  fortune,  or  to  fate,  or  to  law,  everything 
else  in  which  they  did  not  wish  to  discover  the  presence  of  God. 
Under  such  a  system,  faith  would  be  the  servant,  and  not  as  it 
ought,  the  master  of  human  feeling.  If  we  see  God  in  any  one 
part  of  his  works,  we  must,  for  a  like  reason,  see  him  in  every 


200     ON  A  GENERAL  AND  PARTICULAR  PROVIDENCE. 

other  part.  If  we  exclude  him  from  any  one  part,  we  must,  for  a 
like  reason,  exclude  him  from  all. 

The  conclusion  is  forced  upon  us,  that  we  are  to  see  God  in 
every  event,  even  in  those  that  may  seem  most  trifling  and  minute. 
The  saying  commends  itself  to  enlightened  reason,  as  well  as  to 
our  faith  and  feeling,  "  A  sparrow  cannot  fall  to  the  ground  with- 
out him."  "  The  very  hairs  of  our  head  are  all  numbered." 

The  half-learned  man  is  apt  to  laugh  at  the  simple  faith  of  the 
clown  or  savage,  who  tells  us  that  rain  comes  from  God.  The 
former,  it  seems,  has  discovered  that  it  is  the  product  of  certain 
laws  of  air,  water,  and  electricity.  But  truly  the  peasant  is  the 
more  enlightened  of  the  two,  for  he  has  discovered  the  main  cause, 
and  the  real  actor;  while  the  other  has  found  the  second  cause, 
and  the  mere  instrument.  It  is  as  if  a  friend  were  to  send  us  a 
gift  of  skilful  and  beautiful  workmanship,  and  just  as  our  grati- 
tude was  beginning  to  rise  to  the  donor,  some  bystanders  were  to 
endeavor  to  damp  it  all,  by  telling  us  that  the  gift  is  the  product 
of  certain  machinery  which  he  had  seen.  "I  call,"  says  Sir 
Thomas  Brown,  "  the  effects  of  nature  the  works  of  God,  whose 
hand  and  instrument  she  only  is;  and  therefore  to  ascribe  his 
actions  unto  her,  is  to  devolve  the  honor  of  the  principal  agent 
upon  the  instrument,  which,  if  with  reason  we  may  do,  then  let 
our  hammers  rise  up  and  boast  that  they  have  built  our  houses, 
and  our  pen  receive  the  honor  of  our  writings."*  It  is  surely  pos- 
sible for  us  so  to  expand  our  minds  as  to  discover  both  the  agent 
and  the  instrument — to  discover  the  goodness  of  God  in  the  bles- 
sing sent,  and  the  wisdom  of  God  in  the  means,  so  adapted  to  our 
state,  through  which  the  blessing  has  come. 

It  is  instructive  to  observe  how  the  views  of  the  peasant  and 
philosopher  meet  and  harmonize  at  this  point.  The  savage,  when 
guided  by  faith,  sees  God  in  every  circumstance.  Overlooking  all 
instrumental  causes,  he  piously  ascribes  every  event  to  the  god 
that  he  worships.  The  half-educated  man  is  taught  to  observe, 
that  certain  events  have  second  causes ;  and  in  regard  to  these,  he 
is  tempted  to  feel,  that  it  is  not  needful  to  call  in  the  divine  power 
to  account  for  them.  As  such  science  increases,  one  portion  of 
God's  works  after  another  is  taken  from  under  his  dominion  ;  and 
simple  faith  is  being  superseded  by  a  widening  scepticism.  But, 
as  science  makes  further  progress,  it  discovers  that  ail  the  affairs 
of  the  world  proceed  from  causes  that  are  fixed,  and  so  concate- 
*  Religio  Medici,  Sect.  16. 


THE    DIVINE    PROVIDENCE.  201 

nated,  that  if  we  exclude  God  from  any  of  his  works,  we  must,  on 
the  same  ground,  exclude  him  from  them  all ;  and  if  we  admit 
him  in  any  case,  we  are  necessitated  to  admit  him  in  every  case. 
The  enlightened  philosopher,  who  has  penetratde  farthest  into  the 
mysteries  of  nature,  arrives  at  last  at  the  conclusion  with  which 
the  believing  savage  and  peasant  set  out,  that  God  is  to  be  seen 
in  the  rain,  and  the  sunshine,  and  in  every  event.  "  The  ancients," 
says  Plutarch,  "  directed  their  attention  simply  to  the  divine  in 
phenomena,  as  God  is  the  beginning  and  centre  of  all,  and  from 
him  all  things  proceed,  and  they  overlooked  natural  causes.  The 
moderns  turned  themselves  wholly  away  from  that  divine  ground 
of  things,  and  supposed  everything  could  be  explained  from 
natural  causes.  Both  these  views  are,  however,  partial  and  de- 
fective, and  the  right  consideration  of  the  matter  requires  that 
both  should  be  combined." 

The  course  through  which  society  passes,  is  that  through  which 
many  a  youth  has  to  run  before  he  reaches  a  settled  belief.  Trained 
in  a  pious  household,  he  was  led  to  see  the  hand  of  God  in  every 
object  which  presented  itself  to  his  eye;  till  on  being  initiated  in 
a  secular  and  ill-understood  science,  he  feels  as  if  he  might  sepa- 
rate and  remove  certain  portions  of  nature  from  the  direct  power 
of  God.  The  true  cure  for  the  evils  which  proceed  from  a  half 
learning  is  to  be  found  in  a  thorough  learning.  When  this  youth 
has  reached  a  greater  height  of  knowledge,  the  error  proceeding 
from  imperfect  glimpses  will  disappear.  The  partial  views  which 
he  obtained  in  climbing  the  hill  of  science,  were  more  confused 
than  those  which  he  obtained  while  standing  on  the  plain  below  ; 
and  it  is  not  till  he  reaches  the  summit,  and  the  whole  scene 
stretches  out  beneath  him,  that  they  become  clear  and  compre- 
hensive. 

Human  science  contemplated  under  this  aspect  is  a  circle ;  as 
we  go  round  it,  we  obtain  many  pleasant  and  instructive  views ; 
but  we  arrive  at  last  at  the  point  at  which  we  set  out,  or  should 
have  set  out,  at  simple  faith  in  an  all-acting  God. 

SECTION  IV.— METHOD  OF  INTERPRETING  THE  DIVINE  PROVIDENCE. 

Providence  is  no  doubt  a  lesson-book  spread  out  before  us  that 
we  may  read  it.  Yet  it  is  a  difficult  and  mysterious  book.  There 
are  persons  who  talk  of  the  certainty  of  nature,  in  contradistinc- 
tion to  what  they  are  pleased  to  call  the  obscurity  of  the  Scriptures. 


202 


METHOD    OF    INTERPRETING 


And,  no  doubt  the  volume  of  inspiration  has  its  mysteries  j  for 
"  a  religion  without  its  mystery,  would  be  a  temple  without  its 
God."  *  But,  most  assuredly,  the  volume  of  providence  is  as  much 
more  difficult  to  be  understood  than  the  volume  of  the  word,  as 
hieroglyphical  writing  is  much  more  difficult  of  interpretation  than 
alphabetical. 

We  have  entered  the  laboratory  of  nature,  we  have  viewed  its 
processes,  and  we  think  that  we  have  discovered  the  actual  method 
of  the  divine  providence.  We  can  conceive  that,  with  a  different 
race  to  govern,  a  race  guided  by  .the  moral  law  which  God  hath 
prescribed,  it  would  not  have  been  needful  to  ordain  that  singular 
combination  of  means  which  often  produces  such  sudden  and  un- 
expected results.  The  method  of  governing  the  world  by  ap- 
parently accidental,  but  really  intended  coincidences,  by  frequent 
trials  and  deliverances,  seems  to  have  a  peculiar  adaptation  to  the 
character  of  man.  But,  however  this  may  be,  it  is  evidently  the 
mode  actually  employed.  And  the  power  thereby  exercised  is  a 
very  awful  one,  and  can  be  wielded  suddenly  and  irresistibly, 
without  the  possibility  of  the  results  being  anticipated  or  stayed 
for  an  instant.  This  power,  used  for  restraint  and  punishment, 
is  also  employed  for  benign  purposes ;  and  blessings  are  thereby 
conveyed  to  God's  creatures,  not  only  rich  and  liberal  in  them- 
selves, but  in  admirable  adaptation  to  the  circumstances  and 
characters  of  those  on  whom  the  favors  are  lavished. 

The  general  question  presses  itself  upon  us.  How  is  the  provi- 
dence of  God  to  be  interpreted  ?  This  general  question  resolves 
itself  into  three  particular  ones,  which  are  often  confounded,  but 
which  ought  to  be  carefully  separated  : — To  what  extent  is  God 
to  be  seen  in  the  works  of  nature?  When  may  we  discover  an 
intended  connection  between  one  part  of  God's  works  and  another  ? 
When  may  we  discover  the  particular  design  of  the  divine  dispen- 
sations? 

I.    To    WHAT     EXTENT    IS    GoD    TO    BE    SEEN    IN    THE     WORKS 

OF  NATURE  ? — To  this  question,  a  clear  and  decisive  answer  can 
be  given.  He  is  to  be  seen  in  every  work  of  nature  and  event  of 
providence. 

If  God  had  confined  himself  to  the  mere  blind  operation  of 
general  laws,  it  might  have  been  difficult  to  determine  as  to  any 
given  event,  whether  it  was  one  of  the  objects  contemplated  as 
desirable  to  be  produced  when  the  law  was  fixed,  or  whether  it  is 

*  E.  HalL 


THE    DIVINE     PROVIDENCE.  203 

merely  one  of  its  incidental  effects.  But  in  consequence  of  the 
infinitely  wise  adjustment  of  these  laws,  we  can  confidently  say 
of  every  event  that  happens,  that  it  was  contemplated  and  in- 
tended in  the  providence  of  God. 

Almost  all  the  mistakes  into  which  mankind  have  fallen,  in  re- 
gard to  the  interpretation  of  providence,  have  arisen  from  not  car- 
rying out  this  principle  thoroughly. 

There  are  persons  who  willingly  ascribe  certain  events  to  God, 
but  hand  over  others  to  chance.  But  ever  since  the  days  of 
Anaxagoras,  who  defined  chance,  that  which  has  its  "  cause  un- 
perceived  by  human  reasoning,"  every  thinking  mind,  when  the 
subject  is  brought  under  its  notice,  is  forced  to  acknowledge  that 
chance  is  a  word  simply  expressive  of  our  ignorance.  An  acci- 
dental event  is  one  of  which  we  may  rK)t  be  able  to  discover  the 
cause  or  the  purpose.  But  while  man  cannot  discover  the  precise 
cause,  yet  he  knows  that  there  is  a  cause,  and  while  the  design 
may  be  concealed,  yet  there  is  most  assuredly  a  purpose  contem- 
plated ;  and  we  may  rest  assured  that  the  cause  has  been  ap- 
pointed to  produce  this  particular  effect,  and  this  effect  to  serve 
the  specific  purpose.  The  wisdom  of  God  is  peculiarly  seen  in 
his  constituting  a  large  class  of  events  as  contingent  in  the  view 
of  man ;  but  instead  of  being  independent  of  God,  it  is  specially 
by  these  events  that  he  fulfils  his  own  purposes,  and  becomes 
truly  the  governor  of  his  own  world. 

Fleeing  to  an  opposite  extreme,  there  are  persons  who  there  fall 
into  precisely  the  same  error.  They  feel,  and  talk,  and  write,  as 
if  it  was  not  necessary  to  discover  the  presence  of  God  in  those 
events  which  occur  according  to  a  general  law.  By  referring  an 
event  to  such  a  law,  they  feel  as  if  they  had  placed  it  out  of  the 
special  dominion  of  God.  We  cannot  find  language  strong 
enough  to  express  our  indignation  against  those  who  neglect  to 
see  God  in  his  works,  because  these  works  are  done  in  a  regular 
manner.  Whatever  the  parties  may  profess,  their  system  is  real 
atheism.  Nor  is  our  indignation  lessened  when  we  find  the  errors 
of  the  infidel  countenanced  by  those  who  affect  to  be  the  defend- 
ers of  religion.  According  to  the  doctrine  of  parties  now  referred 
to,  God  is  to  be  specially  seen  in  those  occurrences  of  which  the 
cause  is  unknown.  Little  attention  is  paid  by  them  to  those  deal- 
ings and  dispensations  of  God,  of  which  the  physical  cause  is  ob- 
vious. These,  it  is  thought,  may  be  ascribed  to  nature,  or  divided 
between  God  and  nature  ;  and  they  may  be  allowed  to  pass  away 


204  METHOD    OF    INTERPRETING 

without  its  being  needful  seriously  to  weigh  them  and  improve 
them.  But  wherever  there  is  mystery,  wherever  the  instrumental 
causes  are  so  remote,  or  so  complicated,  that  they  cannot  be  de- 
tected, there,  it  is  supposed,  is  the  place  at  which  God  peculiarly 
works.  We  repudiate  this  distinction  as  of  a  most  perilous  charac- 
ter. We  believe  that  every  event  has  a  physical  cause ;  but  we 
believe,  at  the  same  time,  that  this  circumstance  does  not  render 
the  event  less  the  work  of  God.  In  some  cases  the  cause  is  ob- 
vious, and  in  others  more  recondite;  but  in  the  one  as  in  the 
other,  we  are  to  discover  the  operation  of  Deity.  Let  us  adopt 
an  opposite  principle,  and  we  are  landed  in  the  most  inexplicable 
confusion;  and  religion  may,  with  truth,  be  represented  as  the 
mother  of  devotion,  for  our  religion  must  be  in  proportion  to  our 
ignorance.  An  ignorant  *man  can  discover  no  physical  cause  of 
an  event  which  has  happened,  and  so  he  must  ascribe  it  to  God ; 
but  another  man  has  discovered  a  producing  cause  in  nature,  and 
so  needs  to  take  no  notice  of  a  higher  power.  According  to  this 
system  an  event  is  ascribed  in  one  age  to  God,  and  in  a  more  ad- 
vanced age  it  is  referred  to  nature.  It  follows  that  ignorant  na- 
tions must  be  the  most  pious,  and  enlightened  nations  are  neces- 
sitated to  be  infidel  in  proportion  to  their  progress  in  science. 
Religion,  or  rather  superstition,  is  not  aware  how  effectually  it  is 
playing  into  the  hands  of  atheism  by  the  sanction  which  it  gives 
to  such  a  principle — a  principle  which  would  make  man's  religion 
decrease  as  his  knowledge  of  physical  nature  was  augmented. 
Yet  it  is  this  narrow  and  superstitious  sentiment  which  produces 
all  that  jealousy  of  the  discovery  of  law,  which  is  still  so  common, 
among  those  who  profess  to  be  religious.  The  jealousies  which 
they  entertain,  and  the  principles  which  they  lay  down,  furnish 
the  infidel  with  the  only  plausible  arguments  which  he  can  use  in 
his  attempts  to  banish  God  from  his  works. 

In  dropping  the  principle  for  which  we  are  contending,  we  fall 
into  errors  of  all  various  kinds  and  shapes.  Thus  there  are  some 
who  distinguish  between  great  events  and  great  men,  put  under 
the  special  care  of  God,  and  common  events  left  to  shift  for  them- 
selves as  best  they  can.  But  it  is  a  low  and  unworthy,  and,  to 
the  mass  of  mankind,  a  most  uncomfortable  view  which  is  given 
of  our  common  ruler,  when  he  is  spoken  of  as  merely  caring  for 
persons  and  occurrences  regarded  by  the  world  as  great.  The 
great  body  of  mankind  are  not  great  men,  nor  are  they  called 
to  transact  great  events — and  are  they  to  be  compelled  to 


THE    DIVINE     PROVIDENCE.  205 

regard  themselves  as  overlooked  in  the  system  of  Providence  be- 
cause great  talents  or  large  spheres  of  usefulness  have  not  been 
allotted  to  them  ?  Truly  it  is  no  consolation  to  the  poor  man, 
under  his  privations,  to  inform  him  that  he  has  been  overlooked 
in  the  care  taken  of  individuals  and  events  regarded  as  of  more 
importance.  It  is  indeed  a  mockery  of  the  individual  exposed  to 
heavy  affliction  to  tell  him  that  God  regulates  all  matters  of  mo- 
ment, but  has  regarded  it  as  unnecessary  to  make  provision  for 
his  particular  case.  The  only  view  which  will  elevate,  cheer,  and 
gladden  the  great  mass  of  mankind  in  all  their  various  difficulties 
and  trials,  is  that  which  pictures  God  as  a  father  who  takes  charge 
of  all  his  creatures  without  exception,  and  makes  provision  for 
each  according  to  his  state  and  circumstances. 

Discard  the  principle  of  God's  universal  presence  in  all  events, 
and  we  fall  under  the  guidance  of  mere  feeling  and  caprice. 
Thus  the  superstitious  man  sees  God  only  in  those  events  which 
excite  or  startle  the  mind.  He  discovers  God  in  the  storm,  but 
not  in  the  sunshine  ;  in  the  hurricane,  but  not  in  the  calm  ;  in 
the  disease  which  prostrates  his  body,  but  not  in  the  health  which 
so  long  supported  it ;  in  short,  in  those  things,  and  in  those  things 
only,  which  call  forth  feelings  of  curiosity  and  wonder,  astonish- 
ment and  fear. 

The  natural  recoil  from  superstition  is  scepticism ;  and  when 
we  exclude  God  from  certain  portions  of  his  works,  the  atheist 
pursues  us,  and  shows  that  from  a  like  reason  we  should  exclude 
him  from  all  others.  When  Diagoras,  who  was  reputed  an  athe- 
ist, came  to  Samothrace,  some  one  pointed  out  to  him  the  votive 
tablets  erected  by  those  who  had  escaped  the  perils  of  the  ocean, 
and  thus  addressed  him  : — "  Thou  who  thinkest  that  the  gods 
neglect  human  affairs,  do  you  not  observe,  from  so  many  painted 
tablets,  how  many  by  their  vows  have  testified  that  they  have  es- 
caped the  power  of  the  tempest,  and  arrived  in  safety  in  this  har- 
bor ?"  "  It  happens  thus,"  was  the  reply, — "  they  erect  no  tablets 
who  have  suffered  shipwreck  and  perish  in  the  sea."*  All  who 
would  confine  the  power  of  God  to  mere  deliverances  from  dangers 
created  by  the  laws  of  nature,  that  is,  by  the  laws  of  God,  expose 
themselves  to  similar  objections  pertinent  or  impertinent ;  nor  can 
scepticism  be  successfully  resisted  except  by  putting  the  whole  of 
nature  under  the  dominion  of  its  Governor. 

No  doubt  this  doctrine  of  a  universal  Providence  may  be  abused, 
*  Cic.  de  Nat.  Deor.,  iii.  37. 


206 


METHOD    OP    INTERPRETING 


but  it  can  be  abused  only  by  departing  from  it.  There  are  minds 
that  will  fix  themselves  on  certain  events,  and  these  of  the  most 
trivial  nature,  and  build  on  them  the  most  unworthy  conceptions 
of  the  Divine  character.  But  it  is  against  these  narrow  views  that 
the  doctrine  of  a  universal  Providence,  including  every  particular, 
provides  the  most  effectual  remedy,  by  calling  upon  us  to  extend 
our  view,  and  embrace  all  particulars*  The  doctrine  which  we 
are  now  defending  condemns  alike  those  who  see  God  only  in  great 
events,  and  those  who  see  him  only  in  those  that  are  minute,  and 
demands  that  we  discover  him  .in  both,  and  give  to  both  their  due 
place  and  importance.  "  In  minds  of  a  puny  form,"  says  Isaac 
Taylor,  "  whose  enthusiasm  is  commonly  mingled  with  some  de- 
gree of  abject  superstition,  the  doctrine  of  a  particular  Providence 
is  liable  to  be  degraded  by  habitual  association  with  trivial  and 
sordid  solicitudes."  "  The  fault  in  those  instances  does  not  con- 
sist in  an  error  of  opinion,  as  if  even  the  most  trivial  events  were 
not  equally  with  the  most  considerate  under  the  Divine  manage- 
ment ;  but  it  is  a  perversion  and  a  degradation  of  feeling  which 
allows  the  mind  to  be  occupied  with  whatever  is  frivolous  to  the 
exclusion  of  whatever  is  important."  * 

The  events  of  Providence  appear  to  us  very  much  like  the  let- 
ters thrown  into  a  post-bag,  and  this  parcel  then  sent  forth  on  its 
destination.     The  person  who  carries  it- 
Messenger  of  joy 

Perhaps  to  thousands,  and  of  grief  to  some, 

To  him  indifferent  whether  grief  or  joy. 

Onward  he  moves,  quite  unconcerned  as  to  the  nature  of  the  com- 
munications he  bears,  or  the  effects  produced  by  them.  And  when 
we  look  into  that  repository  it  may  seem  as  if  its  contents  were  in 
inextricable  confusion,  and  we  wonder  how  the  letters,  parcels, 
documents,  money,  and  periodicals,  should  ever  reach  their  indi- 
vidual destinations*  But  then  every  letter  has  its  special  address 
inscribed  upon  it — it  has  the  name  and  residence  of  the  party,  and 
so  it  shall  in  due  time  fall  into  his  hands,  and  bring  its  proper  in* 
telligence.  And  what  different  purposes  do  these  letters  fulfil  !— 
what  varied  emotions  do  they  excite  !  This  declares  that  friends 
are  in  health  and  prospering — this  other  is  the  bearer  of  the  new§ 
of  wealth,  or  of  the  wealth  itself — this  third  tells  of  some  crush- 
*  Nat.  Hist,  of  Enth, 


THE    DIVINE    PROVIDENCE.  207 

ing  disappointment,  and  quenches  long-cherished  hopes  by  the 
tidings  of  the  utter  failure  of  deep-planned  schemes — while  this 
fourth,  %ith  sable  symbols,  announces  to  the  wife  that  she  is  a 
widow,  or  to  the  parent  that  he  is  childless,  or  to  the  child  fondly 
cherished  by  the  mother  that  he  is  an  orphan.  Each  has  its  in- 
telligence, and  conveys  it  to  the  party  intended  regardless  of  the 
emotions  that  are  excited. 

It  is  a  kind  of  picture  of  the  movements  of  Providence.  What 
a  crowd  of  events  huddled  together,  and  apparently  confused,  does 
it  carry  along  with  it !  Very  divers  are  the  objects  bound  up 
in  that  bundle,  and  very  varied  are  the  emotions  which  they  are 
to  excite  when  opened  up,  and  yet  how  coolly  and  systematically 
does  the  vehicle  proceed  on  its  way.  Neither  the  joy  nor  the  sor- 
row which  it  produces  causes  it  to  linger  an  instant  in  its  course. 
But  meanwhile,  every  occurrence,  or  bundle  of  occurrences,  is  let 
out  at  its  proper  place.  Each  has  a  name  inscribed  upon  it,  and 
each  has  a  place  to  which  it  is  addressed.  Each,  too,  has  a  mes- 
sage to  carry,  and  a  purpose  to  fulfil.  Some  of  these  inspire  hope 
or  joy,  and  others  raise  fear  and  sorrow.  The  events  which  are 
unfolded  by  the  same  course  of  things,  and  which  fall  out  the 
same  day,  bring  gladness  to  one,  and  land  another  in  deepest 
distress.  On  the  occurrence  of  the  same  event  you  perceive  one 
weeping  and  another  rejoicing.  Some  of  the  dispensations  are 
observed  to  propagate  prosperity  through  a  whole  community. 
And  these  others,  so  black  and  dismal,  and  of  which  so  many 
arrive  at  the  same  time,  carry,  as  they  are  scattered,  gloom  into 
the  abodes  of  thousands.  But  amid  all  this  seeming  confusion, 
every  separate  event  has  its  separate  destination.  If  pestilence 
has  only  some  one  person  devoted  to  it  in  a  city  or  community, 
that  person  it  will  assuredly  find  out,  and  execute  the  judgment 
of  heaven  regarding  him.  If  there  be  a  thousand  persons  allotted 
to  it  in  a  district,  it  will  not  allow  one  of  the  thousand  to  escape. 
If  among  the  numbers  who  are  dying  there  be  one  regarding 
whom  it  has  no  commission  to  seize  upon  him,  that  individual 
must  remain  untouched.  "  A  thousand  shall  fall  at  thy  side,  and 
ten  thousand  at  thy  right  hand,  but  it  shall  not  come  nigh  thee." 
It  has  a  commission,  and  it  will  execute  it ;  but  then  it  cannot 
£o  beyond  its  commission.  And  in  regard  to  every  person  to 
whom  the  event  comes,  it  has  a  special  end  to  accomplish  ;  and 
it  bears  a  special  message,  if  he  will  but  read  it  and  attend  to  it. 

Carrying  out  this  principle  fully,  the  reflecting,  not  to  speak  of 


METHOD   OF    INTERPRETING 

the  devout  mind,  has  ever  found  much  instruction  in  watching 
the  dispensations  of  Divine  Providence.  But  a  second  question 
here  presses  itself  upon  us. 

II.  IN  WHAT  CIRCUMSTANCES  MAY  WE  DISCOVER  AN  IN- 
TENDED CONNECTION  BETWEEN  ONE  PART  OF  GoD?S  WORKS 
AND  ANOTHER? 

It  is  evident  that  there  are  such  designed  correspondences  of  one 
event  to  another.  The  deepest  thinkers  have  been  prone  to  dive 
into  these  profundities.  "In  my  opinion,"  says  Davy,*  "profound 
minds  are  the  most  likely  to  think  lightly  of  the  resources  of  hu- 
man reason,  and  it  is  the  perfect  superficial  thinker  who  is  gener- 
ally strongest  in  every  kind  of  unbelief.  The  deep  philosopher 
sees  chains  of  causes  and  effects  so  wonderfully  and  strangely 
linked  together,  that  he  is  usually  the  last  person  to  decide  upon 
the  impossibility  of  any  two  series  of  events  being  independent  of 
each  other  ;  and  in  science,  so  many  natural  miracles,  as  it  were, 
have  been  brought  to  light,  such  as  the  fall  of  stones  from  me- 
teors in  the  atmosphere,  the  disarming  a  thunder  cloud  by  a  met- 
alic  point,  the  production  of  fire  from  ice  by  a  metal  white  as 
silver,  and  the  referring  certain  laws  of  motion  of  the  sea  to  the 
moon — that  the  physical  inquirer  is  seldom  disposed  to  assert  con- 
fidently on  any  abstruse  subject  belonging  to  the  order  of  natural 
things,  and  still  less  so  on  those  relating  to  the  more  mysterious 
relations  of  moral  events  and  intellectual  natures." 

But  while  there  is  abundant  room  in  the  method  of  Providence 
for  extraordinary  coincidences,  and  wonderful  recurrences  intended 
by  God,  we  must  on  that  very  account  be  the  more  on  our  guard 
against  that  mystical  and  speculative  spirit  which  would  multiply 
them  without  evidence.  The  intricacy  of  God's  procedure,  while 
it  admits  of  his  appointing  mysterious  connections  between  events, 
also  furnishes  a  field  in  which  human  fancy  and  conjecture  will 
delight  to  sport.  The  human  spirit  has  often  wandered  in  the 
mazes  of  Divine  Providence  without  a  pathway  to  keep  it  in  the 
right  direction,  and  invented  correspondences  and  analogies  which 
were  never  thought  of  by  the  Creator  of  the  world.  The  arts  of 
divination,  necromancy,  and  astrology,  have  betaken  themselves 
to  these  high  and  misty  regions,  whence  it  has  been  most  difficult 
to  dislodge  them. 

Are  there  no  rules  to  guide  us  in  determining  when  a  connection 

*  Salmonia. 


THE    DIVINE    PROVIDENCE.  209 

or  coincidence  is  intended,  and  when  it  is  delusive?     The  follow- 
ing may  be  of  much  assistance. 

First,  we  may  regard  the  connection  as  intended  whenever  we 
can  discover  a  natural  tie,  that  is,  a  tie  in  the  system  of  causes 
and  laws  which  God  hath  appointed.  We  say  laws  as  well  as 
causes,  for  from  reasons  already  explained,  there  may  be  general 
laws  of  nature  observed  when  the  causes  are  utterly  unknown. 
All  events  connected  causally,  and  all  events  connected  by  an  ob- 
servable invariable  law,  may  be  held  as  joined  by  the  appoint- 
ment of  God.  It  is  by  the  observation  of  the  bonds  of  union,  as 
we  have  seen,  that  the  mind  acquires  its  practical  foresight  and 
scientific  knowledge.  There  are  such  correspondences  and  con- 
nections strewn  all  around  us  that  we  may  observe  them  and  act 
upon  them. 

Secondly,  we  may,  upon  satisfactory  evidence,  believe  in  such 
coincidences  as  intended,  when  we  discover  -a  moral  tie.  We  hold 
the  moral  law  to  be  as  much,  to  say  the  least  of  it,  the  appoint- 
ment of  God  as  any  natural  law.  As  there  are  harmonies  pre- 
established  between  one  natural  law  and  another,  so  there  may 
be,  so  there  are,  harmonies  between  the  moral  law  and  the  phy- 
sical laws.  God  has  so  ordered  his  physical  government,  that  it 
is  made  in  various  ways  to  support  his  moral  government,  both  in 
the  way  of  encouraging  that  which  is  good  and  beneficent,  and 
arresting  and  punishing  that  which  is  evil.  Now,  whenever  we 
can  discover  such  a  moral  tie  we  may,  always  in  the  exercise  of 
common  sense  and  a  sound  judgment,  believe  in  intended  coinci- 
dences when  supported  by  a  sufficient  induction  of  facts. 

Thirdly,  we  may,  on  the  same  terms,  believe  in  such  corre- 
spondences when  we  can  discover  a  religious  tie.  For  just  as  we 
hold  man  to  be  a  physical  and  a  moral,  so  we  also  hold  him  to  be 
a  religious  agent.  And  as  there  are  connections  between  the 
physical  and  the  physical,  and  between  the  physical  and  the 
moral,  so  there  may  also  be  connections  between  the  physical  and 
the  religious.  As  the  physical  government  of  God  is  so  arranged  as 
to  uphold  the  moral  ends  of  God,  it  may  be  also  so  arranged  as  to 
provide  an  answer  to  prayer,  to  order  the  destinies  of  the  pious  in 
all  faithfulness  and  love,  and  to  help  on  the  true  religion  in  its 
progress  towards  universality.  The  heaving  of  the  waves,  in 
correspondence  with  the  motions  of  the  moon,  is  not  more  certain 
than  the  movements  of  earthly  events  in  correspondence  with 
heavenly  influences. 

14 


210  METHOD    OF    INTERPRETING 

Guided  by  these  principles,  and  guarded  by  sound  sense,  the 
inquiring  mind  will  discover  many  and  wonderful  designed  con- 
nections between  the  various  events  of  Divine  Providence.  Read 
in  the  spirit  of  faith,  striking  coincidences  will  everywhere  mani- 
fest themselves.  What  singular  unions  of  two  streams  at  the 
proper  place  to  help  on  the  exertions  of  the  great  and  good  t 
What  curious  intersections  of  cords  to  catch  the  wicked  as  in  a 
net,  when  they  are  prowling  as  wild  beasts  !  By  strange  but 
most  apposite  correspondences  human  strength,  when  set  against 
the  will  of  God,  is  made  to  waste  away  under  God's  indignation 
burning  against  it,  as  in  heathen  story,  Meleager  wasted  away 
as  the  stick  burned  which  his  mother  held  in  the  fire. 

A  consistency  not  visible  at  first  sight  may  thus  be  traced 
throughout  the  whole  scheme  of  God's  Providence.  When  the  eye 
is  made  to  run  over  years  and  ages,  it  will  discover  a  track  reach- 
ing along  the  whole  line,  now  disappearing,  but  again  clearly 
marked  ;  a  stream  meandering  and  sometimes  hiding  itself,  and 
seemingly  lost,  yet  like  Arethusa  appearing  again,  and  holding  on 
its  way  to  the  place  to  which  it  has  to  bear  its  waters.  There 
will  be  seen  a  line  of  transmission  from  age  to  age,  and  events 
are  explained  by  other  events  separated  from  them  by  a  thousand 
removes.  Looked  at  in  a  narrow  and  prying  and  jealous  spirit, 
every  individual  part  may  seem  to  be  mere  twisted  and  inter- 
twined threads,  yet  eventually  out  of  the  whole  is  formed  a  web 
of  varied  but  beauteous  and  harmonious  texture. 

So  far  as  the  connections  are  natural  we  have  already  contem- 
plated them,  and  so  far  as  they  are  moral  and  religious,  they  will 
yet  come  under  our  notice.  Meanwhile  it  may  be  needful,  in  the 
way  of  caution,  to  show  how  these  general  rules,  in  guiding  us  to 
connections  which  are  real,  will  keep  us  from  trusting  in  others 
which  are  visionary.  Of  this  latter  description  are  omens,  charms, 
incantations,  the  spells  that  are  used  in  witchcraft  and  necromancy, 
and  the  supposed  relations  of  events  which  give  rise  to  divination 
and  astrology.  The  more  mysterious  chemical  agents,  it  is  thought, 
may  be  used  in  an  inexplicable  way  for  inflicting  or  preventing 
direful  evils.  Dreams,  the  shape  of  the  clouds,  the  flight  of  birds, 
and  especially  of  certain  birds,  as  the  eagle  and  the  raven,  the 
pecking  of  chickens,  the  state  of  a  brute's  entrails,  the  rolling  of 
thunder,  the  movements  of  the  planets,  the  very  ravings  of  maniacs, 
and  the  neighing  of  horses,  have  all  been  regarded  as  prognostics 
of  future  events.  '*  The  Egyptians  and  Babylonians  dwelling  in 


THE    DIVINE    PROVIDENCE.  211 

plains  drew  foreknowledge  from  the  mystic  dances  of  the  stars. 
The  Etruscans,  addicted  to  the  frequent  offering  of  sacrifices, 
derived  it  from  the  inspection  of  the  entrails  of  animals,  and  from 
the  prodigies  in  the  heavens  and  earth  which  fell  frequently  under 
their  notice  owing  to  the  nature  of  their  climate  and  country.  The 
pastoral  Arabians,  Phrygians,  and  Cilicians,  wandering  over  their 
plains  and  mountains,  sought  to  pierce  futurity  by  the  observa- 
tion of  the  flight  and  music  of  birds."*  Our  Saxon  forefathers 
"trusted  in  their  magical  incantations  for  the  cure  of  disease,  for 
the  success  of  their  tillage,  for  the  discovery  of  lost  property,  for 
tincharmiug  cattle,  and  the  prevention  of  casualties.  One  day 
was  useful  for  all  things ;  another,  though  good  to  tame  animals, 
was  baleful  to  sow  seeds.  One  day  was  favorable  to  the  com- 
wlencement  of  business,  another  to  let  blood,  and  others  wore  a 
forbidding  aspect  to  these  and  other  things.  On  this  day  they 
were  to  buy,  on  a  second  to  sell,  on  a  third  to  hunt,  on  a  fourth  to 
do  nothing.  If  a  child  was  born  on  such  day,  it  would  live  ;  if  on 
another,  its  life  would  be  sickly ;  if  on  another,  it  would  perish 
early."t 

Now,  let  it  be  observed  first  of  all,  in  reference  to  the  supersti- 
tious trust  in  such  connections,  that  it  is  not  the  legitimate  follow- 
ing out  of  the  doctrine  of  a  particular  Providence,  According  to 
that  doctrine,  God  is  to  be  seen  in  every  event;  but  in  the  super- 
stitious trust  referred  to,  it  is  assumed,  farther,  that  certain  events 
are  connected  together  in  a  mysterious  manner.  We  may  believe 
in  the  connection  of  every  event  with  God  as  its  author;  while  we 
<do  not  believe  in,  but  rather  positively  deny,  that  events  no  way 
causally,  or  morally,  or  religiously  connected,  have  yet  an  inex- 
plicable association,  supposed  to  be  the  means  of  widening  the 
sphere  of  man's  knowledge,  but  in  reality  the  means  of  perplexing 
and  confounding  him.  There  is  no  impossibility  involved  in  the 
Stoic  idea,  that,  according  to  the  constitution  of  things,  certain 
signs  should  precede  certain  occurrences.!  We  do  not  deny  the 
possibility  of  God  establishing  such  a  harmony  between  things 
that  have  nu  visible  connection ;  but  we  deny,  as  a  matter  of  fact, 
that  God  has  instituted  such  a  correspondence.  The  burden  of 
proof  lies  on  those  who  maintain  the  positive  doctrine ;  and  the 
evidence  furnished  is  as  visionary  as  are  the  fancies  of  those  who 
dwell  in  these  regions  of  mysticism.  A  few  casual  coincidences, 

*  Cic.  de  DiviR.,  Lib.  i.  93,  94.  f  Turner's  Anglo-Saxons,  B.  vii.  c.  13. 

t  See  Oic.  de  Divio.,  Lib.  i.  118, 


212  METHOD    OP    INTERPRETING 

eagerly  seized  upon  by  an  excited  temper,  are  no  proof  of  a  con- 
nection, causal  or  contemplated.  Nor  do  we  find  much  difficulty 
in  explaining  the  mystic  or  superstitious  belief  referred  to,  and  that 
without  supposing  that  it  has  evidence  to  build  on.  It  lives  in  the 
regions  of  mists  and  clouds — where  fancy  may  weave  her  shapes 
to  suit  its  humors,  and  where  excited  feeling  will  form  every  half- 
seen  object  into  ghosts  and  spectres. 

We  can  easily  enter  into  some  of  the  feelings  which  lead  men 
to  betake  themselves  to  oracles  and  auguries.  Every  one  must  at 
times  have  felt  an  intense  desire  to  get  a  glimpse  of  the  objects 
behind  that  vail,  which  hanging  immediately  before  usy  ever  hides 
futurity  from  our  view.  The  man  is  about  to  take  an  important 
step,  that  may  exercise  a  momentous  power  over  his  future  des- 
tiny ;  he  is  setting  out  on  an  important  journey,  or  commencing  a 
great  undertaking ;  he  is  a  husbandman,  and  about  to  sow  the 
crops  which  are  to  be  his  sustenance ;  or  he  is  a  king,  invited  to 
enter  into  a  truce  or  declare  war ;  or  a  soldier  about  to  buckle  on 
his  armor  j  or  he  has  arrived  at  a  crisis  in  his  own  affairs,  or  in 
those  of  the  society  with  which  he  is  connected  ;  he  has  long  been 
pursuing  some  favorite  plans,  which  are  expected  speedily  to  bring 
important  results ;  he  is  on  the  eve  of  great  events,  for  evil  or  for 
good  ;  he  is  on  a  bed  of  distress,  and  sees  death  looking  in  at  the 
curtains  ;  and  the  wish  of  his  heart  is.  that  there  were  but  some 
means  of  looking  into  that  dim  futurity,  of  decjding  his  hesitating 
judgment,  and  putting  an  end  to  this  intensely  painful  suspense. 
At  such  times,  the  mind  will  catch  at  every  fact  or  fancy  that 
may  seem  fitted  to  relieve  its  perplexities.  Is  there  no  gifted  man 
who  sees  farther  than  others  into  the  coming  hour  which  is  so 
portentous  ?  Are  there  no  appointed  connections  by  which  the 
future  may  be  seen  in  the  present  or  the  past?  Can  no  horoscope 
be  constructed,  by  which  these  mystic  movements  of  the  planets 
may  be  made  to  reveal  the  coming  movements  of  earthly  events  ? 
Will  no  voice  issue  from  some  hallowed  grove  or  'shrine  ?  Will 
no  whisper  of  these  breezes,  no  form  in  these  mists  or  clouds,  no 
vision  of  supernatural  being,  be  vouchsafed  to  guide  us  in  these 
perplexities,  or  at  least  to  put  an  end  to  this  uncertainty,  more  ex- 
cruciating than  the  most  dreadful  reality.  Prom  feelings  that 
have  been  at  work  in  our  own  breast,  we  can,  in  some  measure, 
understand  the  intensity  of  passion  which  led  Brutus  to  see  the 
vision  before  the  battle  of  Philippi ;  which  brought  Saul,  before 
engaging  in  his  last  battle,  to  the  witch  of  Endor,  to  call  up  his 


THE    DIVINE    PROVIDENCE.  213 

faithful  monitor,  Samuel ;  and  which  induced  a  king  of  Israel,  who 
had  suffered  what  seemed  to  be  a  fatal  injury  by  a  fall,  to  send 
messengers  to  the  famous  temple  at  Ekron.  Without  at  all  sup- 
posing that  heaven  lends  its  sanction  to  such  frivolities,  we  can 
understand  how  men  should  be  led  at  all  times  of  excited  feeling, 
whether  of  fear  or  expectation,  to  have  recourse  to  those  dreams 
and  mysteries  and  casualties  which  furnish  the  materials  of 
all  those  omens  or  charms  which  superstition  and  knavery 
employ. 

Left  without  sufficient  evidence  to  support  them,  we  are  led,  by 
all  the  analogy  of  the  Divine  procedure,  to  condemn  them.  There 
arc  far  too  much  of  high  dignity  and  solemn  majesty  in  the  march 
of  Providence  to  admit  of  its  stooping  down  to  construct  these  co- 
incidences of  petty  ingenuity,  worthy  only  of  a  mystic,  a  magician, 
or  a  boy  poet.  While  such  dim  and  distant  correspondences  could 
•confer  no  real  benefit  on  mankind,  they  would  ever  tempt  the 
mind  to  waste  its  strength,  mounted  on  an  unbridled  fancy,  bear- 
ing its  rider  whithersoever  it  would.  So  far  as  mankind  cannot 
discover  the  future  by  the  use  of  their  faculties,  in  observing  the 
ordinary  proceedings  of  Providence,  it  were  vastly  better,  both  for 
their  peace  and  moral  discipline  and  improvement,  that  the  cloud 
should  continue  to  rest  upon  it.  The  wisdom  of  God  is  seen,  as 
much  in  what  he  hath  concealed,  as  in  what  he  hath  revealed. 

It  is,  therefore,  safest,  and  in  every  way  best,  to  keep  to  the 
rules  which  we  have  laid  down,  and  insist  on  a  natural,  a  moral, 
or  a  religious  law,  connecting  the  events  that  are  supposed  to  be 
coincident ;  and  if  no  such  law  can  be  pointed  out,  at  once  to 
declare  the  connection  to  be  casual.  The  light  of  science,  which 
investigates  natural  law,  has  already  put  to  flight  many  of  these 
birds  of  night  which  disappear  in  the  morning.  A  rigid  attention 
to  moral  and  religious  law  should  drive  away  the  remainder,  to 
leave  us  to  contemplate,  with  less  distraction,  the  real  mysteries 
of  God's  providence,  employed  in  the  support  of  his  moral  and 
a-eligious  government. 

A  third  question  yet  remains  to  be  answered. 

III.  WHEN  MAY  WE  REGARD  OURSELVES  AS  ENTITLED  TO  FIX 

ON  THE  PRECISE  END  CONTEMPLATED    BY    GOD    IN    ANY    GIVEN 
EVENT  ? 

We  may  safely  affirm,  in  reference  to  this  question,  that  God 
intends  to  produce,  by  the  event,  the  consequences  that  flow  from 
at,  according  to  the  natural  ordinances  of  his  Providence.  He  un- 


214  METHOD    OF    INTERPRETING 

doubtedly  means  the  cause  to  produce  its  effects,  and  the  train  of 
causes  to  be  followed  by  its  train  of  consequences. 

But  may  he  not  intend  also  to  serve  other  ends,  not  following  so* 
naturally  or  necessarily?  Most  assuredly  ne  may.  But  jt  is 
more  difficult  for  us  to  determine  specially,  and  in  any  given  case, 
what  these  ends  are.  Some  persons  decide  on  this  subject  as  dog- 
matically as  if  they  had  been  the  counsellors  of  deity,  or  let  into- 
all  the  secrets  of  his  government.  There  is  one  inquiry,  however, 
which  we  should  always  make,  and  that  is,  what  are  the  lessons 
which  we  may  gather  for  our  own  personal  instruction?  In 
making  this  inquiry  in  an  humble  spirit,  we  may,  if  guided  by  a 
pure  moral  law  and  a  true  religion,  gather  daily  lessons  from  the 
dispensations  of  providence.  In  doing  so,  it  is  not  needful  to  deter- 
mine the  precise  ends  of  deity.  Our  primary  anxiety  should  be 
to  determine  what  are  the  lessons  which  we  should  learn ;  and  if 
we  are  enabled  to  learn  these  lessons,  we  may  safely  concluder 
that  this  was  one  of  the  special  ends  contemplated  in  the  wisdom 
of  heaven.  If  it  be  needful  to  go  farther,  we  must  ever  take  along 
with  us  the  rules  which  have  been  previously  laid  down..  We 
may  always  connect  events  together  which  have  a  physical  con- 
nection ;  and  in  regard  to  other  connections,  we  must  be  quite 
sure  that  they  are  linked  by  the  moral  or  religious  laws  of  God. 
The  winds  that  sunk  the  Spanish  Armada,  which  threatened  at 
once  the  Protestant  religion  and  the  liberties  of  England ;  and 
again,  the  favorable  breezes  which  enabled  William  of  Oranger 
when  these  privileges  were  endangered,  to  escape  the  fleet  that 
was  ready  to  seize  him,  and  land  in  safety  on  our  shores  :*  these 
are  providential  occurrences,  in  which  pious  minds  have  ever 
delighted  to  discover  the  hand  of  God  ;  and  this,  too^,  with  reason,. 

*  Mr.  Macaulay  says,  "  The  weather  had  indeed  served  the  Protestant  cause  so  well,, 
that  some  men,  of  more  piety  than  judgment,  believed  the  ordinary  laws  of  nature  to 
have  been  suspended  for  the  preservation  of  the  liberty  and  religion  of  England. 
Exactly  a  hundred  years  before  this,  they  said  the  Armada,  invincible  by  man,  had 
been  scattered  by  the  wrath  of  God.  Civil  freedom  and  divine  truth  were  again  in, 
jeopardy,  and  agmn  the  obedient  elements  had  fought  for  the  good  cause.  The  wind 
had  blown  strong  from  the  east,  while  the  Prince  wished  to  sail  down  the  Channel ; 
had  turned  to  the  south  when  he  wished  tc*enter  Torbay ;  had  sunk  to  a  calm  during 
the  disembarkation;  and  as  soon  as  the  disembarkation  was  completed,  had  risen  to 
;t  storm,  and  had  met  the  pursuers  in  the  face," — Hist,  of  Enyland,  vol.  ii.  We  have 
quoted  this  language  for  the  purpose  of  expressing  our  astonishment,  that  a  mind  so 
expanded  as  Mr.  Macaulay's  should  not  have  seen  that  God,  instead  of  requiring  to 
suspend  his  laws,  might  have  arranged  them  with  the  very  view  of  bringing  aboud 
these  beneficent  results. 


THE    DIVINE     PROVIDENCE.  215 

according  to  the  principles  which  we  have  been  developing.  Nor 
can  we  regard  as  less  striking  those  internal  dissensions  which 
drove  the  Pilgrim  Fathers  from  England,  to  found  in  the  far  west 
a  country  which  should  acknowledge  its  inferiority  to  England 
only  in  this  respect,  that  the  one  is  the  mother,  and  the  other  the 
daughter.  History,  rightly  interpreted,  shows  us  many  instances 
of  national. crime  being  followed  by  its  appropriate  punishment. 
"The  expulsion  of  the  Moors,  the  most  industrious  and  valuable 
inhabitants  of  the  Peninsula,  has  entailed  weakness  upon  the 
Spanish  monarchy,  which  the  subsequent  lapse  of  two  centuries 
has  been  unable  to  repair.  The  reaction  against  the  Roman 
atrocities  produced  the  great  league,  of  which  William  was  the 
head  ;  it  sharpened  the  swords  of  Eugene  and  Marlborough  ;  it 
closed  in  mourning  the  reign  of  Louis  XV.  Nor  did  the  national 
punishment  stop  here.  The  massacre*  of  St.  Bartholomew,  and 
revocation  of  the  edict  of  Nantes,  were  the  chief,  among  remote, 
but  certain  causes  of  the  French  Revolution,  and  all  the  unutter- 
able miseries  which  it  brought  upon  the  Bourbon  race,  and  the 
professors  of  the  Romish  faith."* 

Mankind  have  in  all  ages  experienced  the  greatest  interest,  and 
yet  the  greatest  difficulty  in  interpreting  those  events  of  Provi- 
dence which  are  afflictive  in  their  character.! 

Now,  we  have  not  arrived  at  that  stage  of  our  investigation  at 
which  we  may  determine  precisely  the  meaning  of  physical  evil. 
The  ends  which  it  serves  in  the  Providence  of  God  are  evidently, 
however,  of  a  mixed  character. 

Sometimes  it  seems  to  be  PUNITIVE,  and  the  expression  of  the 
Divine  disapproval  of  sin.  We  can  take  no  lower  or  lesser  view 
of  it  in  some  of  its  forms. 

At  other  times,  it  seems  to  be  PREVENTIVE  of  evil.  In  every 
shape  in  which  it  may  come,  it  is  disagreeable  at  the  time ;  but 
it  is,  notwithstanding,  often  like  the  mantle  of  snow,  which  iu 
these  colder  regions  covers  the  spring  grain  in  winter,  a  means  of 
preservation  from  a  greater  and  more  fatal  scourge. 

Not  unfrequentiy  it  is  PURIFYING  in  its  nature.  It  is  in  the 
furnace  that  the  dross  is  separated. 

Now,  it  is  often  difficult  to  determine  as  to  any  given  afflic- 
tion, whether  it  is  meant  to  accomplish  the  one  or  the  other  of 

*  Alison's  Marlborough. 

•{•  See  this  whole  subject  treated  in  the  light  of  Scripture  and  the  highest  phi- 
losophy  in  the  two  admirable  works  of  the  Rev.  Dr.  Buchanan  on  Affliction. 


216 


METHOD    OF    INTERPRETING 


these  purposes,  or  whether  it  may  not  be  subservient  to  them 
all. 

Here,  as  in  regard  to  every  dispensation,  we  are  on  safe  ground, 
when,  in  the  first  instance,  we  observe  God  in  every  event ;  and 
when,  in  the  second  place,  we  inquire  what  are  the  lessons  which 
it  is  fitted  to  read  us.  This  should  be  the  habit  of  every  soul; 
which  would  pay  becoming  obeisance  to  the  teaching  of  its  Crea- 
tor. When  we  make  the  farther  inquiry,  what  is  the  end  con- 
templated by  God,  in  ordaining  this  event  or  that  event,  difficulties 
thicken  around  us.  One  answer  .we  should  always  be  ready  to 
give,  and  that  is,  that  the  human  mind  cannot  discover  all  the 
purposes  which  may  be  intended  by  any  of  the  operations  of  God. 
He  accomplishes  a  variety  of  ends  by  the  same  means ;  and  it 
would  be  presumptuous  in  us  to  conclude  that  we  had  discovered 
all  the  object  which  God  contemplates  in  any  one  of  his  dispen- 
sations. One  salutary  reflection  will  rise  in  every  thinking  mind 
on  the  survey  of  affliction,  under  all  its  various  forms — that  it  is 
a  blessed  thing  that  God  has  kept  such  matters  in  his  own  hand, 
instead  of  committing  them  to  man  ;  for  trials,  like  powerful 
medicines,  need  to  be  dispensed  in  proper  quantities,  and  by  a 
careful  hand,  lest  there  be  one  drop  too  little  or  too  much. 

Great  caution  must  at  all  times  be  exercised  in  inquiring  into 
what  are  supposed  to  be  the  judgments  of  heaven.  The  Great 
Teacher,  who  has  given  us  such  enlarged  and  comforting  views 
of  the  Divine  guardianship,  is  careful  to  warn  us  against  the  in- 
fluence of  prejudice  and  passion  in  the  interpretation  of  the  pro- 
ceedings of  God  towards  our  fellow-men.  "  Suppose  ye  that  these 
Galileans  were  sinners  above  all  the  Galileans,  because  they  did 
such  things?  I  tell  you  nay;  but  except  ye  repent,  ye  shall 
all  likewise  perish.  Or  those  eighteen  on  whom  the  tower  of 
Siloam  fell,  and  slew  them,  think  ye  that  they  were  sinners  above 
all  men  that  dwelt  in  Jerusalem?  I  tell  you  nay  ;  but  except  ye 
repent,  ye  shall  all  likewise  perish."  The  error  of  the  Jews  mani- 
festly consisted  in  yielding  to  an  uncharitable  temper  of  mind. 
The  same  error,  proceeding  from  tho  same  spirit,  is  still  exhibited. 
If  an  individual  has  always  been  suspected  of  some  secret  crime, 
an  extraordinary  reverse  of  fortune  is  thought  sufficient  to  estab- 
lish it.  If  great  and  apparently  lasting  prosperity  is  suddenly 
changed  into  unexpected  adversity,  it  is  thought  to  be  in  righteous 
retribution  for  some  act  of  fraud  or  dishonesty  ;  and  men  begin  to 
search  for  cases  in  which  he  defrauded  the  orphan,  or  overreached 


THE    DIVINE    PROVIDENCE.  217 

the  simple,  or  gratified  his  own  selfishness  at  the  expense  of  the 
public  good.  It  is  not  at  the  time  when  prosperity  is  disposed  to 
smile  on  the  individual,  that  these  insinuations  are  made  and 
pass  current  j  at  these  moments,  men  have  not  the  courage 
boldly  to  face  the  culprit,  and  denounce  the  crime  ;  but  like  cow- 
ards, they  wait  till  he  has  been  laid  prostrate  by  the  hand  of  an- 
other :  they  only  persecute  those  whom  the  Lord  has  already 
smitten,  and  hasten  to  add  reproach  to  misery,  and  insult  to  suf- 
fering. 

But  still,  we  may  in  some  cases  confidently  discover  the  judg- 
ments of  God.  There  are  certain  physical  evils  which  proceed 
directly  from  sin — as  the  poverty  which  follows  extravagance,  and 
the  disease  which  springs  from  intemperance  and  other  vices  : 
and  we  are  only  referring  the  effect  to  its  cause,  when  we  connect 
the  two  together.  In  other  cases  also,  the  connection,  being  al- 
ways of  a  moral  or  religious  character,  may  be  so  visible  as  at 
once  to  compel  every  man  to  discover  the  overruling  arrangements 
of  heaven,  in  making  physical  events  encourage  the  good  or 
punish  tlie  evil.  But  in  all  such  cases,  both  facts  must  be  as- 
certained, and  each  on  its  own  independent  evidence,  before  the 
relation  can  be  discovered.  We  must  not  conclude  that  any 
given  deed  is  sinful,  merely  because  it  has  been  followed  by 
certain  prejudicial  consequences.  But  when  the  deed  is  proved 
to  be  sinful  on  other  evidence,  we  may  connect  the  two  to- 
gether, for  it  looks  as  if  God  had  connected  them.  We  are  not 
to  conclude  that  any  individual  has  been  guilty  of  secret  or 
highly  aggravated  sin,  merely  because  he  has  been  exposed  to 
affliction.  This  was  the  error  of  the  friends  of  Job,  and  for  which 
they  were  severely  reprimanded.  But  when  he  is  known,  on  in- 
dependent evidence,  to  have  sinned ;  and  when  the  sin  seems  to 
have  led  to  the  suffering,  we  are  warranted  in  tracing  a  connec- 
tion appointed  by  God  himself. 

It  is  comparatively  seldom  that  we  have  such  a  minute  ac- 
quaintance with  every  event  in  the  past  life  of  a  neighbor,  as  to 
be  able  to  determine  the  precise  end  contemplated  in  any  visita- 
tion of  God  towards  him.  In  some  cases,  indeed,  the  connection  is 
manifest  to  the  man's  intimate  friend,  or  to  the  world  at  large,  as 
when  intemperance  and  excess  lead  to  poverty  and  disease,  and 
cunning  leads  to  distrust,  and  is  caught  in  the  net  which  it  laid 
for  others.  In  other  cases,  the  connection  is  only  visible  to  the 
individual  himself,  or  his  most  intimate  friends.  In  all  cases,  it 


218          PRACTICAL    INFLUENCE    OF    THE    VARIOUS    VIEWS 

is  easier  to  determine  the  meaning  of  the  judgments  of  God  in 
reference  to  ourselves,  than  in  their  reference  to  others,  when  they 
are  exposed  to  them.  Being  ourselves  acquainted  with  all  the 
incidents  of  our  past  life,  we  may  trace  a  connection  between 
deeds  which  we  have  done,  and  trials  sent  upon  us — a  connection 
which  no  other  is  intended  to  perceive,  or  so  much  as  to  suspect. 
While  affliction  can  in  no  case  prove  the  existence  of  sin  not 
otherwise  established,  yet  it  may  be  the  means  of  leading  the  per- 
son afflicted  to  inquire,  whether  he  may  not  in  his  past  life  have 
committed  some  sin,  of  which  this  is  the  punishment  or  cure, 
Here,  as  in  many  other  cases,  the  rule  is  to  be  strict  in  judging 
ourselves,  and  slow  in  judging  others. 


SECTION  V.— PRACTICAL  INFLUENCE  OF  THE  VARIOUS  VIEWS 
WHICH  MAY  BE  TAKEN  OF  DIVINE  PROVIDENCE. 

An  ancient  heathen  philosopher  and  historian  has  drawn  an 
ingenious  comparison  between  atheism  and  superstition.*  With 
the  additional  light  which  we  now  enjoy,  we  find  it  needful  to 
multiply  the  objects  compared,  that  we  may  be  enabled  to  form  a 
juster  estimate  of  each. 

Some  see  God  in  none  of  his  works.  This  is  the  error  of  a 
mind  besotted  by  passion,  or  stung  by  an  evil  conscience,  or  which 
has  lost  itself  in  the  mazes  of  proud  and  rash  speculation.  IT  is 
ATHEISM.  If  it  could  be  cured  by  reason,  we  would  bid  it  open 
its  eyes,  and  reflect  upon  the  instances  of  order  and  design  to  be 
found  in  every  department  of  God's  works.  But  atheism  is  a 
crime,  rather  than  a  mere  intellectual  error.  It  is  to  be  cured  only 
by  its  being  so  humbled  as  to  be  constrained  to  look  at  the  traces 
of  an  intelligent  mind,  which  the  Creator  has  imprinted  on  all  his 
works  around  us,  and  of  a  governor  and  judge  imprinted  on  the 
heart  within. 

Again,  there  are  some,  and  their  number  is  multiplying  witli 
advancing  science,  who  cannot  but  see  prevailing  order  in  the 
works  of  God,  and  are  prepared  to  appreciate  their  beauty,  but 
who  have  a  difficulty  in  distinguishing  between  them  and  the 
Creator.  Observing  a  universal  harmony,  they  can  rise  to  no 
higher  conception  of  deity  than  as  a  principle  of  order  inhabiting  the 
universe,  but  not  to  be  distinguished  from  it.  IT  is  PANTHEISM. 
It  is  the  error  of  a  mind  delighting  to  reflect  on  order  and  law,  but 
*  Plutarch  on  Superstition. 


WHICH    MAY    BE    TAKEN    OF    DIVINE    PROVIDENCE.         219 

with  no  adequate  conception  of  the  moral  and  the  spiritual. 
Were  it  disposed  to  leave  its  own  idle  fantasies  and  follow  us,  we 
would  show  that  it  is  in  error,  by  pointing  to  the  traces  of  a  ruling, 
as  well  as  an  inherent  principle,  of  a  governor,  as  well  as  a  per- 
vader  of  the  universe ;  we  would  point  to  the  skilful  adjustment 
of  the  laws  of  nature,  which,  as  distinguished  from  the  laws  of 
nature  themselves,  is  specially  called  the  Providence  of  God,  and 
which  gives  evidence  of  a  power  in  nature,  but  which  is  also  above 
nature.  "Although,"  says  Clarke,  "God  is  in  all  the  universe, 
it  does  not  follow  that  he  is  the  soul  of  the  world.  The  human 
soul  is  a  part  of  a  compound,  of  which  the  body  is  the  other  part; 
and  these  two  act  mutually  on  each  other,  as  being  the  parts  of 
the  same  whole.  But  God  is  in  the  universe,  not  as  a  part  of  the 
universe,  but  as  its  governor.  He  acts  on  everything,  but  nothing 
has  the  power  of  action  on  him."* 

Farther,  there  are  those  who  perceive  God  only  in  certain  of 
his  works,  in  the  more  striking  agents  of  nature,  .and  the  more 
startling  events  of  his  Providence,  in  the  lightning's  flash  and  the 
meteor's  glare,  in  all  unexpected  occurrences,  in  sudden  elevations, 
or  reverses  of  fortune,  in.  pestilence,  disease,  and  death,  but  not  in 
the  calmer  but  no  less  powerful  and  wonderful  agents  ever  in 
operation — the  sunshine,  the  revolving  seasons,  the  continued  en- 
joyment of  health,  and  the  munificent  provision  made  for  the  sus- 
tenance of  man  and  the  supply  of  his  varied  wants.  God  is  seen 
by  them,  but  not  in  all  his  works — in  those  only  which  awe  the 
imagination,  which  excite  the  fancy,  or  which  move  the  deeper 
feelings  and  passions  of  the  heart.  IT  is  SUPERSTITION.  It 
springs  from  a  conscience  awakened  but  not  pacified,  in  a  mind 
under  fear,  but  yet  without  faith.  If  its  restlessness  would  allow 
it  calmly  to  consider  any  subject,  we  would  widen  its  range  of 
view  so  as  to  make  it  embrace  all  that  is  benign  and  peaceful,  all 
that  is  orderly  and  benevolent  in  the  works  of  God.  We  would 
make  it  view  the  earth  when  it  is  bathed  in  loveliness  in  the  calm 
of  a  summer  evening,  as  well  as  when  it  is  agitated  by  storm,  to 
look  on  the  heavens  not  only  when  covered  with  angry  clouds, 
but  when  their  face  is  serene  in  the  softest  blue,  or  shining  in 
brilliancy  in  the  light  of  the  thousand  lamps  which  they  nightly 
kindle. 

Finally,  there  are  those  who  discover  reigning  design  in  all 
God's  works,  and  so  are  opposed  to  Atheism ;  who  discover  evi- 
*  Letters  to  Leibnitz. 


220  PRACTICAL    INFLUENCE    OF   THE    VARIOUS    VIEWS 

dence  of  a  power  separated  from  and  above  nature,  a  pure  and 
benevolent  God,  and  so  have  extricated  themselves  from  the  toils 
of  Pantheism  ;  who  observe  a  present  God  in  the  more  striking 
agents  which  he  employs,  but  who  trace  him,  too,  in  those  daily 
gifts  which  are  not  less  beneficent  because  they  are  constantly 
bestowed,  and  in  those  regular  arrangements  of  Providence  which 
are  not  less  wonderful  because  they  may  have  become  familiar 

tO    US.       IT    IS    A    SOUND    AND     ENLIGHTENED    FAITH.       It    keeps 

the  mind  in  a  vigorous  and  healthy  state.  The  atmosphere  of 
which  it  breaths  is  at  once  strengthening  and  refreshing,  unlike 
that  air  all  azote,  of  which  the  atheist  breathes  till  every  living 
affection  is  chilled  into  death,  or  that  air  so  close  and  sultry  in 
which  the  pantheist  wastes  a  dreamy  and  useless  existence,  or 
that  air  now  so  highly  oxygenated,  and  now  so  exhausted  of 
the  principle  of  life,  so  elevating  and  depressing  by  turns,  in 
which  the  victim  of  superstition  passes  a  life  of  restlessness  and 
fever. 

The  error  of  the  atheist  arises  from  his  not  observing  the  foot- 
steps of  a  designing  mind  in  the  heavens  and  earth  without  us, 
or  of  a  Governor  and  Judge  in  the  moraj  sense  or  law  within  us. 
The  error  of  the  pantheist  does  not  consist  in  his  contemplating 
the  laws  of  nature,  so  exact  and  so  beautiful,  but  in  refusing  to 
look  beyond  them  to  a  wise,  an  intelligent,  a  righteous,  and  be- 
nevolent Being,  who  not  only  gave  to  matter  all  its  laws,  but  all 
its  arrangements  also,  and  uses  them  for  the  furtherance  of  moral 
ends.  The  error  of  the  superstitious  man  consists  in  his  seeing 
God  only  in  those  events  which  are  fitted  to  startle  his  fears  or  stir 
his  fancy,  while  he  pays  no  regard  to  other  portions  of  God's  works 
reflecting  no  less  clearly  the  perfections  of  his  character.  The 
atheist  closes  his  eyelids,  and  asserts  that  there  is  no  God  because 
he  will  not  open  his  eyes  to  behold  the  traces  of  him.  The  philo- 
sophical and  poetical  pantheist,  the  worshipper  of  nature,  opens 
his  eyes  only  half  way;  and  amidst  the  many  lovely  "dreams 
that  wave  before  the  half  shut  eye,"  he  refuses  to  gaze  upon  the 
still  lovelier,  but  more  dazzling  image  of  a  holy  God.  The  victim 
of  superstition  opens  and  shuts  his  eyes  by  turns,  opens  them 
when  there  is  anything  to  alarm  or  please,  and  shuts  them  against 
all  that  might  enlighten  the  reason,  or  mould  the  character  after 
•the  image  of  a  perfect  God.  True  faith  opens  the  eyes,  and  keeps 
them  fully  directed  upon  the  glorious  works  of  nature,  and  won- 
derful events  of  Providence,  till  they  rise  in  glowing  admiration 


WHICH    MAY    BE    TAKEN    OP    DIVINE    PROVIDENCE.         221 

to  the  perception  of  a  light  ever  shining,  with  unchanged  and  un- 
changeable lustre,  upon  a  universe,  rejoicing  in  its  beams;  and 
they  continue  to  gaze  till,  "  dazzled  by  excess  of  light,"  they 
shut  themselves,  in  holy  meditation  and  devout  adoration. 

The  atheist  would  extinguish,  if  he  could,  all  the  lights  in  the 
universe,  and  leave  us  in  utter  darkness.  The  pantheist  would 
blot  out  at  least  the  sun  from  the  heavens,  and  leave  only  the 
lovely,  it  may  be,  but  lesser  lights  of  nature,  which  make  the 
night  beautiful,  but  leave  no  room  for  free  and  fearless  action. 
The  superstitious  man  would  leave  in  the  heavens  the  dazzling 
meteor  and  the  piercing  lightning,  and  would  kindle  all  along  the 
surface  of  the  earth  glaring  and  lurid  fires,  not  dispelling  but  col- 
oring the  darkness,  and  disposing  men  now  to  ecstatic  action,  and 
now  to  prostrating  helplessness.  True  religion  would  rejoice  in 
all  the  lights  which  God  has  given  and  would  kindle  no  others, 
that  man  in  fear,  but  still  in  confidence  and  love,  may  perform  the 
duties  which  Providence  has  allotted  to  him. 

Atheism  gives  us  nothing  to  rest  on  but  unconscious  matter 
and  blind  fate,  rude  materials,  but  no  building  to  dwell  in.  Pan- 
theism shows  us  a  beautiful  mansion,  but  the  sight  is  melancholy  ; 
we  have  no  desire  to  enter  the  building,  for  it  is  without  an  in- 
habitant ;  there  is  no  warm  heart  to  beat,  and  no  just  mind  to 
rule,  in  these  large  but  tenantless  halls.  Superstition  gives  us  a 
strangely  formed  fabric,  such  as  the  eye  shapes  in  the  darkness 
of  night  out  of  objects  imperfectly  seen  ;  it  peoples  that  man- 
sion with  pale  ghosts  and  horrid  spectres,  possessed  of  awful 
power,  but  power  often  used  for  evil  rather  than  good.  True  faith 
introduces  us  into  a  large  and  stately  and  well-constructed  man- 
sion ;  and  tells  of  a  holy  and  benignant  inhabitant  within,  who 
no  doubt  restrains  and  punishes  evil,  but  rejoices  also  in  all  that  is 
pure  and  lovely. 

Atheism  is  a  system  cold,  and  damp,  and  dark  as  the  place  of 
the  dead.  Pantheism  gives  us  illusions  which  "  serve  to  alleviate 
nothing,  to  solve  nothing,  to  illuminate  nothing;  they  are  vapors 
which  may  indeed  show  bright  and  gaudy  colors,  when  seen  at  a 
great  distance,  but  in  the  bosom  of  which,  if  one  enters,  there  is 
nothing  but  chill  and  gloom."*  Superstition  shows  a  strange 
land  of  mingled  light  and  darkness,  with  scenes  ever  shifting  with 
the  capricious  temper  of  those  who  rule  over  them  without  grace 
and  without  dignity,  who  are  now  sportive  and  now  revengeful, 
*  North  British  Review,  1846,  No.  I,  John  Foster. 


PRACTICAL    INFLUENCE    OF    THE    VARIOUS    VIEWS 

but  never  just  and  never  benevolent,  while  those  subjected  to  their 
power  alternate  between  wild  merriment  and  excruciating  misery. 
True  faith  opens  our  eyes  on  a  world  on  which,  no  doubt,  there 
rests  a  mysterious  cloud,  rising  from  the  damps  of  sin,  but  above 
which  there  is  a  luminary  shining  with  bright  and  steady  beams, 
and  before  which  that  cloud  must  at  last  fade  away  and  disap- 
pear, and  leave  a  land  of  perpetual  calm  and  never-ending  light. 
The  ATHEIST  is  bold  and  audacious,  but  it  is  with   the  au- 
dacity of  a  man   who   is  contending  with  an  inward  principle. 
Plutarch  is  wrong  in  saying  that  he  is  free  from  all  fear  and  per- 
turbations of  mind.     You  may  observe  that  he  is  awe-struck  at 
the  void  which  he  hath  made,  and  he  starts  at  the  sounds  which 
he  strikes  up  to  relieve  the  sepulchral  silence.     If  he  fears  not 
God,  he  fears  the  next  event,  dark  and   horrid,  which  blind  fate 
may  evolve.     He  boasts  that  he  is  above  the  fear  of  punishment ; 
but  he  may  be  oppressed  by  a  dread  of  pain,  and  he  knows  of  no 
comforter  to  cheer  him  under  it.     The  PANTHEIST  wanders  in  a 
lovely  region,  but  he  meets  there  with  no  friend  to  cheer,  to  sym- 
pathize with,  to  support,  to  comfort  him.     He  talks  of  communion 
with  nature,  or  the  spirit  of  nature ;  but  his  idea  is  ever  evapo- 
rating and  vanishing  into  nothing ;  and  the  real  thought  is  ever 
pressed  upon  him  that  the  whole  is  an  illusion,  since,  there  is  no 
living  being  to  feel  responsive  to  his  feelings,  and  his  soul  saddens 
under  a  sense  of  utter  loneliness.     He  feels  like  a  man  shut  up  in 
an   abode  of  surpassing  magnificence,  but   without  a   friend  to 
whom  he  can  unbosom  himself; — he  is  worse  than  Rasselas  in 
his  Blessed  Valley.     He  perceives  that  all  is  regular  and  harmo- 
nious, but  still  there  is  something  wanting ;  he  is  alone,  and  "  it 
is  not  good  for  man  to  be  alone,"  in  respect  either  of  the  creature 
or  the  Creator.     Such  is  his  feeling,  even  when  nature  wears  a 
smiling  aspect  and  events  are  prosperous,  and  when  the   heavens 
lower,  and  affliction  casts  its  shadow  over  his  path,  and  all  things 
in  this  lower  world  seem  dark,  and  dreary,  and  sullen,  his  melan- 
choly is  soured  into  discontent,  and  irritated  into  murmuring  and 
complaint.     He  complains,  and  no  one  answers,  and   his  spirit  is 
chafed  by  its  own  chidings.     Still  friendless,  he  feels  now  what  it 
is  to  be  friendless  in  the  hour  of  trial.      THE  SUPERSTITIOUS 
man  has  his  moments  of  high  ecstasies,  and  ethereal  pleasure,  of 
convulsive  action,  and  feverish  joy,  but  succeeded  ever  and  anon 
by  periods  of  exhaustion  and  weakness,  of  distaste  to,  and  inca* 
pacity  for  exertion.    After  his  strength  has  spent  itself  he  feels,  in 


WHICH    MAY    BE    TAKEN    OF    DIVINE    PROVIDENCE.         223 

the  ethereal  atmosphere  in  which  he  breathes,  like  those  travellers 
who  ascend  the  Alps  or  Andes  ;  and  who,  when  they  reach  a  cer- 
tain elevation,  experience  a  quickness  of  breathing,  an  acceleration 
of  pulse,  a  loss  of  appetite,  and  nausea,  which  issue  in  a  complete 
prostration  of  strength  and  irresistible  somnolency.  His  very  rest 
is  like  that  produced  by  opiate  drugs,  he  awakes  from  it  in  start- 
ling alarms,  and  with  darker  forebodings.  With  occasional  joy, 
he  is  yet  without  peace ;  harassed  by  fear,  he  is  without  genuine 
trust  and  confidence  ;  scared  by  expected  punishment,  he  is 
never  allured  by  deep  and  fervent  love.  It  is  an  habitual  FAITH, 
looking  to  the  living  and  loving  God,  which  alone  is  fitted  to  im- 
part cheerfulness  to  the  soul  at  all  times,  and  consolation  in  the 
seasons  of  trouble  and  of  death. 

The  ATHEIST  is  rash  in  his  actions,  dark  in  his  passions,  is  apt 
to  be  proud  in  prosperity,  and  comfortless  in  affliction ;  and  when 
wearied  of  life,  he  vainly  attempts  to  terminate  his  existence  by 
an  act,  which  may  indeed  kill  the  body,  but  leaves  the  soul  to  be 
tormented  by  its  passions,  more  furiously  than  ever,  by  scorpions 
instead  of  whips.  The  PANTHEIST  professes  to  follow  nature, 
and  making  no  struggle  to  rise  above  it,  he  is  carried  along  with 
the  stream ;  and  feeling  himself  to  be  a  mere  bubble  upon  its  sur- 
face, he  becomes  a  vain  and  empty  trifler.  He  is  probably  an  idle 
dreamer,  or  a  sipper  of  the  sweets  of  literature,  an  indulger  in  fine 
sentiment,  or  a  wild  speculatist ;  and  with  no  great  end  before 
him,  he  fails  in  accomplishing  any  work  that  may  promote  the 
welfare  of  the  race.  The  SUPERSTITIOUS  MAN  vacillates  between 
hot  and  cold,  between  hope  and  fear,  between  self-confidence  and 
despondency.  He  is  afraid  to  act,  lest  offence  be  given  to  the  God 
he  fears  ;  and  afraid  not  to  act  for  the  same  reason.  He  is  ever 
restless,  but  his  activity  is  more  frequently  exercised  in  spreading 
misery  than  in  propagating  good.  It  is  FAITH  in  a  living  God, 
the  governor  of  nature,  that  calls  forth  the  energies  of  heaven* 
born  souls,  and  sets  them  forth  in  the  work  of  relieving  misery, 
uprooting  corruption,  stemming  the  tide  of  depravity,  and  help- 
ing on  the  amelioration  of  the  race  in  knowledge  and  virtue. 

It  is  curious  to  observe  how  extremes  meet,  just  as  we  find  the 
extreme  east  and  west  meeting  in  the  figures  constructed  on  our 
globes.  Atheism  and  pantheism  may  seem  to  be  utterly  opposed, 
and  yet  they  agree  in  more  than  they  differ.  The  pantheist, 
when  compelled  to  explain  himself,  is  landed  in  atheism  j  while 
atheism,  seeking  to  screen  its  nakedness,  would  fondly  clothe 


224  PRACTICAL    INFLUENCE    OF    THE    VARIOUS    VIEWS 

itself  in  some  of  the  illusions  of  pantheism.  The  regular  laws, 
and  the  mechanical  successions  which  the  one  recognizes,  do  not 
differ  essentially  from  the  principles  of  order  and  development,  of 
which  the  other  delights  to  discourse  so  profoundly,  and  yet  withal 
so  unmeaningly.  The  ideas  of  which  the  one  dreams  are  as  dif- 
ficult to  grasp  as  the  blank  void  which  the  other  creates.  It  has 
often  been  observed  that  superstition,  in  the  natural  recoil  of  the 
human  mind,  leads  to  atheism.  "  Superstition,"*  says  Plutarch, 
"furnishes  both  a  commencement  to  the  production  of  atheism, 
and  when  it  is  gathered,  a  pretext — not  indeed  true  and  fair,  but 
still  not  devoid  of  plausibility,  for  its  continuance.  For  it  is  not 
because  persons  see  anything  blameworthy,  in  the  heavens,  or 
faulty  and  irregular  in  the  stars,  in  the  seasons,  or  revolutions  and 
motions  of  the  sun  around  the  earth,  which  is  the  cause  of  day 
and  night,  or  in  the  nourishment  provided  for  living  creatures,  or 
the  production  of  fruits,  that  they  conclude  that  there  is  no  God 
in  the  universe  ;  but  the  ridiculous  works  and  impulses  of  super- 
stition— its  speeches,  its  movements,  its  omens,  its  charms,  its  at- 
tention to  certain  motions  in  a  circle,  and  to  sounds,  its  impure 
purgations,  its  filthy  acts  of  supposed  chastity,  its  barbarous  and 
unlawful  inflictions  of  punishment  and  affronts  in  temples — all 
these  give  occasion  to  some  to  say,  that  it  were  better  there  were 
no  gods,  than  that  there  were  gods  who  approved  of  and  delighted 
in  these  things — so  tyrannical,  so  imperative  in,  and  so  easity 
offended  by,  trifles."  But  Plutarch  is  mistaken,  when  in  the  same 
passage  he  tells  us  that  superstition  is  on  no  occasion  the  cause 
of  atheism  ;  for  atheism,  by  a  recoil  equally  natural,  issues  in 
superstition.  The  wisest  men  would,  with  Bacon,  rather  believe 
all  the  fables  of  the  Koran,  than  be  driven  to  the  conclusion  that 
this  universe  is  without  a  creator  and  governor.  When  the  mind 
feels  that  scepticism  hath  left  it  nothing  to  stand  on.  it  will  take 
refuge  in  the  first  superstition  which  presents  itself.  It  thus  hap- 
pens, that  while  the  two  may  seem  to  be  opposed  in  their  very 
nature,  they  yet  produce  and  assist  each  other ;  and  there  are  in- 
dividuals and  nations  ever  vacillating  between  the  two — now  be- 
taking themselves  to  the  one,  and  now  to  the  other,  according  to 
the  feeling  which  happens  to  predominate  at  the  time. 

None  of  these  can  present  an  acceptable  service  to  God.  The 
pantheist  professes  to  see  God  in  everything,  but  in  reality  sees 
him  in  nothing.  He  talks  of  the  communion  which  he  holds  with 

*  On  Super.  12. 


WHICH    MAY    BE    TAKEN    OF    DIVINE    PROVIDENCE.         225 

the  spirit  of  the  universe,  but  it  is  the  mere  communion  with  his 
own  thoughts.  He  believes  just  as  little  as  the  atheist  in  a  living 
deity — in  a  ruling  power,  in  a  moral  governor,  a  holy  sovereign, 
or  a  righteous  judge.  Nor  can  God  be  pleased  with  the  perverted 
adoration  which  superstition  offers.  Its  worship  has  always  been 
a  strange  mixture  of  horror  and  of  levity — of  laceration  and  licen- 
tiousness. The  very  idea  entertained  of  God  is  an  affront  offered 
to  him.  "What  sayest  thou  ?  is  he  impious  who  thinks  that 
there  are  no  gods?"  asks  Plutarch;  "and  he  who  believes  them 
to  be  such  as  the  superstitious  man  describes  them,  not  much 
more  impious  ?  For  myself,  I  would  rather  that  men  would  say 
regarding  me  that  there  was  no  such  person  as  Plutarch,  than 
that  they  should  say  that  Plutarch  was  a  person  unsteady,  change- 
able, prone  to  passion,  exacting  revenge  for  inadvertences,  offended 
with  trifles." 

When  the  faith  is  not  a  faith  in  a  living  God,  it  will  produce  no 
living  affection.  When  no  love  is  supposed  to  reside  in  the  Di- 
vine mind,  no  love  to  him  will  be  kindled  in  our  bosoms ;  and 
there  will  be  none  of  that  cheerful  obedience  which  proceeds  from 
affection.  The  heart  of  the  atheist  becomes  as  blank  as  his  sys- 
tem ;  and  the  service  of  the  pantheist  has  as  little  emotion  as  the 
supposed  principle  which  governs  the  universe.  It  is  curious,  too, 
to  observe  how  superstition  lands  us  practically  in  the  same  con- 
sequences as  the  atheism  and  the  pantheism,  which  it  so  much 
abhors.  The  mind  which  discovers  God  only  so  far  as  its  feelings 
are  moved  and  its  fear's  awakened,  will  feel  itself  beyond  restraint 
when  there  is  no  such  excitement.  Hence  the  abject  and  craven 
superstition,  which  prompts  to  trembling  and  despair  when  the 
man  feels  himself  to  be  in  circumstances  of  terror,  is  quite  com- 
patible with  the  most  unbridled  indulgence  and  unblushing  crim- 
inality in  other  circumstances,  when  the  mind  is  freed  from  the 
pressure  of  alarm.  The  man  who  sees  God  only  at  certain  times, 
and  in  certain  places,  as  in  temples  and  groves,  will  feel  as  if  he 
were  beyond  God's  cognizance  and  control  in  all  other  positions. 
Hence  we  find  the  earnest  (we  cannot  say  spiritual)  worshipper 
at  the  altar  cheating  in  the  market-place,  and  indulging  the 
basest  propensities  of  his  nature,  when  he  thinks  himself  under 
the  clouds  of  concealment.  Borrow  is  not  relating  anything  con- 
trary to  human  nature,  when  he  tells  us  of  the  gipsy  mother,  who 
said  to  her  children,  "  You  may  go  and  steal,  now  that  you  have 
said  your  prayers." 

15 


226  METHOD    OP    ANSWERING    PRAYER, 

Whatever  these  systems  may  differ  in,  they  all  agree  In  this, 
that  they  are  not  fitted  to  lay  an  effectual  restraint  on  pride,  on 
lust,  and  passion,  and  the  other  evil  principles  of  the  human 
heart.  The  atheist  glories  in  the  circumstance  that  he  is  unre- 
Htrained.  It  is  one  of  .the  supposed  advantages  of  his  system. 
Not  that  he  thereby  attains  to  greater  freedom  ;  for  the  pride 
which  he  has  called  in  acts  as  the  Saxons  did  when  the  ancient 
Britons  invited  them  to  their  assistance  against  their  northern 
neighbors,  it  proves  a  sterner  master  than  the  power  from  which 
they  wished  to  be  delivered.  Nor  will  the  cobwebs,  which  the 
dreamy  pantheist  weaves,  be  able  to  restrain  the  rising  passion. 
Nay,  the  pleasure  and  lust  by  which  he  is  tempted  will  not  ex- 
perience much  difficulty  in  inducing  the  loose  and  accommodating 
system  to  weave  them  into  their  laws  and  principles  ;  and  evil 
will  be  allowed  as  a  step  necessary  to  the  accomplishment  of  what 
is  good.  As  to  practical  influence,  the  mystic  faith  of  the  panthe- 
ist differs  from  the  absolute  unbelief  of  the  atheist,  as  the  vapors 
which  the  waters  evaporate,  and  the  moon  tinges  with  her  beams 
differ  from  nonentity.  Nor  will  the  irregular  impulses  of  super- 
stition be  able  to  stem  the  ever-flowing  torrent.  Following  the 
impulses  of  feeling,  the  superstitious  man  is  drawn  towards  his 
religious  offices,  only  so  far  as  his  inner  man  is  excited  ;  and 
again,  is  drawn  as  readily  to  what  is  evil,  when  feeling  is  impelling 
him  in  an  opposite  direction. 

Still  less  can  these  systems  quicken,  refine,  and  spiritualize  the 
Boul,  impart  to  it  a  steady  cheerfulness,  or  become  an  overflowing 
source  of  comfort.  Such  effects  cannot  follow  from  a  scheme 
which  gives  no  God,  or  which  gives  us  a  God  without  moral  qual- 
ities, or  a  God  supposed  to  be  capricious.  These  effects  can  fol- 
low only  from  belief  in  a  God,  the  governor  and  judge  of  all,  ever 
restraining  and  punishing,  as  he  ever  hates  sin,  and  yet  withal  as 
loving  and  merciful  as  he  is  just  and  holy. 


SECTION  VI— METHOD  OF  ANSWERING  PRAYER,  AND  FURTHERING 
SPIRITUAL  ENDS. 

Prayer  is  one  of  the  most  exalted  exercises  in  which  the  soul 
can  be  engaged.  It  is  perhaps  the  most  elevated  state  of  thought 
and  feeling  of  which  the  human  mind  is  susceptible,  reaching 
higher  than  the  imaginations  of  the  poet  when  his  eye  is  most 
excited,  and  his  fancy  takes  its  wildest  flights,  and  embracing 


AND    FURTHERING    SPIRITUAL    ENDS.  227 

snore  than  the  capacious  thoughts  of  the  philosopher,  at  the  time 
when  he  has  got  the  glimpse  of  some  bright  discovery  just  circling 
above  the  horizon,  and  throwing  a  flood  of  light  on  objects  before 
wrapt  in  twilight  obscurity.  Can  our  understandings  comprehend 
anything  more  enlarged  than  an  omnipresent  God  ?  Can  our 
wisdom  be  more  profoundly  engaged  than  in  looking  into  the 
unsearchable  depths  of  the  Divine  counsels  ?  Can  our  imagina- 
tions mount  higher  than  those  third  heavens  in  which  the  divinity 
^its  enthroned  ?  Can  our  faith  and  love  repose  anywhere  more 
securely  or  delightfully  than  on  the  word  and  faithfulness  of  God? 
How  can  the  whole  soul  be  so  nobly  or  profitably  employed  as  in 
holding  communion  with  its  Maker?  There  is  no  affection  of  the 
mind  which  is  not  engaged  in  prayer,  except  it  be  the  baser  and 
the  more  depraved  ones  of  our  nature.  Here  is  reverential  awe 
stript  of  all  the  baseness  of  mere  fear ;  here  is  hope,  not  the  mere 
hope  of  earthly  bliss,  but  of  the  favor  of  God,  which,  when  en- 
joyed, is  tjie  fullest  bliss.  Here  is  faith  feeling  itself  firm  and  im- 
movable in  that  being  on  whom  it  rests  ;  and  here  is  love  kindled 
at  the  sight  of  everlasting  love.  True  prayer  quickens  the  soui 
without  agitating  it ;  as  the  river  is  most  interesting  when  there 
is  a  ripple  upon  its  surface  to  show  that  it  is  moving ;  as  the  sky 
is  most  beautiful  when  there  is  enough  of  breeze  to  clear  away 
the  mists  and  damps  that  have  been  exhaled  from  the  earth,  but 
no  storm  to  disturb  its  serenity. 

Prayer,  when  engaged  in,  in  spirit  and  in  truth,  free  from  pride, 
and  the  troublings  of  the  passions,  contains  within  itself  its  own 
answer,  in  the  heavenly  calm  and  repose  which  it  communicates 
to  the  soul.  Like  every  other  good  act,  it  is  its  own  reward. 
When  the  soul  is  thus  spread  out  before  God,  heaven  itself  seems 
to  descend  upon  it,  as  we  have  seen  the  image  of  heaven  reflected 
on  the  bosom  of  a  tranquil  lake  spread  out  beneath  it  The  man 
who  cultivates  a  devotional  spirit  is  like  the  earth  in  its  orbit, 
guided  by  a  central  power,  and  illuminated  by  a  central  light,  and 
carrying  everywhere  a  circumambient  atmosphere,  with  a  life- 
giving  and  refreshing  influence. 

It  is  Rowland  Hill,  if  we  remember  right,  who  compares  prayer 
to  a  man  in  a  small  boat  laying  hold  of  a  large  ship  ;  and  who, 
if  he  does  not  move  the  large  vessel,  at  least  moves  the  small 
vessel  towards  the  large  one.  He  would  thus  illustrate  the  fact, 
that  even  though  prayer  could  not  directly  move  God  towards  the 


228  METHOD    OF    ANSWERING    PRAYER; 

suppliant,  it  would  yet  move  the  suppliant  towards  God,  and  bring 
the  two  parties  nearer  to  each  other. 

Now,  this  is  the  truth,  but  not  the  whole  truth.  We  fear  that 
no  one  will  be  induced  to  pray  for  the  mere  pleasure  of  the  prayer ; 
or  from  the  hope,  that  though  God  is  not  moved  by  it,  he  himself 
may  be  improved.  There  would  be  an  idea  of  illusion  (not  to  say 
hypocrisy)  accompanying  this  feeling,  which  must  render  the 
prayer,  even  if  persevered  in,  powerless  in  its  effects  on  the  man 
himself,  as  well  as  upon  God.  After  hearing  a  sermon  preached 
by  Dr.  Leechman,  in  which  he  dwelt  upon  the  power  of  prayer  to 
render  the  wishes  it  expressed  more  ardent  and  passionate,  Hume 
remarked  with  great  justice,  "  We  can  make  use  of  noexpressionr 
or  even  thought,  in  prayers  and  entreaties,  which  does  not  imply 
that  these  prayers  have  an  influence."*  Prayer  can  accomplish 
the  ends  referred  to  by  Leechman,  only  when  it  proceeds  from  a 
living  faith  in  God,  as  at  once  the  hearer  and  the  answerer  of 
prayer.  In  this  respect,  there  is  a  remarkable  analogy  between 
the  influence  of  the  moral  affections  and  the  influence  of  the  re- 
ligious affections.  All  the  moral  virtues  are  pleasurable  in  them- 
selves, and  lead  to  beneficial  results ;  but  they  do  so  only  when 
they  are  exercised  as  moral  virtues,  and  not  for  the  mere  pleasure 
or  benefits  that  accompany  them.  When  attended  to  for  the  mere 
sake  of  the  consequences,  it  will  be  found  that  the  consequences 
do  not  follow.  In  like  manner,  we  find  that  spiritual  affections 
produce  such  a  hallowed  influence  on  the  soul  only  when  performed 
as  duties  which  we  owe  to  God.  We  must  therefore  seek  for  some 
deeper  foundation  on  which  to  build  the  duty  of  prayer. 

Prayer  has  a  quintuple  foundation  in  natural  religion.  Three 
of  the  arguments  are  merely  subsidiary  to  the  others,  which  fur- 
nish the  proper  basis. 

First,  The  deepest  and  highest  feelings  of  our  nature  prompt  to 
prayer.  Admiration  of  God's  works,  gratitude  for  favors,  a  con- 
sciousness of  guilt,  and  a  sense  of  helplessness,  all  find  their  be- 
coming expression  in  the  soul  pouring  itself  out  to  God.  This  is 
the  result  to  which  they  spontaneously  lead,  except  in  so  far  as 
they  are  restrained,  by  a  speculative  unbelief,  or  by  cherished  sins. 
The  very  atheist  in  these  days  is  compelled  to  become  pantheist, 
that  he  may  find  outlet  to  these  feelings,  in  communion  with  an 
invisible  power.  Rousseau  talks  of  a  "  bewildering  ecstasy,  to 
which  my  mind  abandoned  itself  without  control,  and  which,  in  the 
*  Letter  to  Baron  Mure,  in  Burton's  Life  of  Hume. 


AND     FURTHERING    SPIRITUAL    ENDS.  229 

excitement  of  my  transports,  made  me  sometimes  exclaim,  <Oh, 
great  being  !  oh,  great  being  !'  without  being  able  to  say  or  think 
more." 

To  take  only  one  of  these  feelings — the  sense  of  weakness — 
"  There  is,"  says  Guizot,  "  a  sentiment  to  be  found  under  diverse 
forms  among  all  men,  the  sentiment  of  the  need  of  some  external 
succor,  of  a  support  to  the  human  will,  of  a  force  which  may  lend 
its  force  and  strength  to  our  necessity.  The  man  searches  all 
around  for  this  support,  and  for  .this  force  to  aid  him ;  he  requires 
them  as  the  encouragement  of  friendship,  for  counsel  to  his  wisdom, 
as  an  example  to  copy,  to  approve  of  what  he  likes,  and  from  a 
dread  of  blame.  There  is  not  a  person  who  cannot  produce  in 
his  own  case  a  thousand  proofs  of  this  movement  of  a  soul  seeking 
out  of  itself  an  aid  to  its  own  freedom,  which  it  feels  to  be  at  once 
real  and  insufficient.  And  as  the  visible  world  and  human  society 
do  not  respond  always  to  his  wishes,  as  they  are  infected  with  the 
same  insufficiency  which  he  finds  in  himself,  the  mind  goes  beyond 
the  visible  world,  and  above  human  relations,  for  the  support 
which  it  needs;  the  religious  sentiment  develops  itself,  and  man 
addresses  himself  to  God,  and  calls  him  to  his  succor.  Prayer 
is  the  most  elevated,  though  it  is  not  the  only  form,  under  which 
there  is  manifested  this  universal  sentiment  of  the  feebleness  of 
human  will,  this  recourse  to  an  exterior  force  to  which  it  may  unite."* 

Secondly,  Man's  state  of  dependence  renders  prayer  a  becoming 
exercise.  The  lesson  taught  by  the  inward  feeling  is  also  the 
lesson  taught  by  his  relation  to  the  external  world.  God  has  so 
constituted  his  providence,  that  man  is  ever  dependent  on  his 
Maker  for  the  comforts  and  the  very  necessaries  of  life.  God 
•could,  no  doubt,  have  placed  mankind  in  a  different  constitution 
of  things,  where  praise  and  not  prayer  had  been  the  befitting  ex- 
ercise. Situated  as  he  is,  he  is  constrained  to  feel  a  sense  of  de- 
pendence ;  and  of  this  feeling,  prayer  is  the  suitable  expression. 

But  we  fear  that  neither  of  these  two  considerations,  operating 
singly,  will  be  sufficient  to  produce  steady  and  persevering  prayer. 
For  if  there  are  certain  impulses  of  nature  which  would  draw  us  in 
one  way,  there  are  other  impulses  which  would  draw  us  in  another 
direction.  There  is  pride  holding  us  back  when  we  would  lie  low 
at  the  footstool  of  God's  throne.  There  is  the  opposition  of  the 
heart  to  what  is  spiritual,  repelling  us  when  we  would  come  to  the 
tight  Hence  we  find,  that  in  no  Pagan  religion,  nor  in  natural 
*  Civil,  en  France,  6  ieme  Legon. 


230  METHOD   OF   ANSWERING    PRAYER, 

religion  under  any  of  its  forms,  is  there  any  sustained  or  regular 
prayer  in  the  service  paid  to  the  gods.  Gifts  may  be  offered  to 
express  gratitude,  and  ejaculations  are  emitted  to  give  utterance 
to  a  sense  of  want,  dependence,  and  guilt,  but  there  is  no  prayer 
of  a  continued,  of  an  elevated,  or  elevating  description. 

Under  the  influence  of  distracting  natural  feeling,  the  following 
is  an  experience  to  which  the  hearts  of  many  will  respond.  Early 
trained  to  it  under  the  domestic  roof,  the  person  regularly  engaged 
in  prayer,  during  childhood  and  opening  manhood.  Rut  as  he 
became  introduced  to  general  society,  and  began  to  feel  his  inde- 
pendence of  the  guardians  of  his'youth,  he  was  tempted  to  look 
upon  the  father's  commands  in  this  respect  as  proceeding  from* 
sourness  and  sternness ;  and  the  mother's  advice,  as  originating 
in  an  amiable  weakness  and  timidity.  He  now  becomes  more 
careless  in  the  performance  of  acts  which  had  never  before  been, 
omitted.  How  short,  how  hurried,  how  cold  are  the  prayers  which. 
he  now  utters.  Then  there  come  to  be  mornings  on  which  he  is 
snatched  away  to  some  very  important  or  enticing  work,  without 
engaging  in  his  customary  devotions.  There  are  evenings,  too, 
following  days  of  mad  excitement,  or  sinful  pleasure,  in  which  he 
feels  utterly  indisposed  to  go  into  the  presence  of  God,  and  to  be 
left  alone  with  Him.  He  feels  that  there  is  an  utter  incongruity 
between  the  ball-room,  OF  the  theatre  which  he  has  just  left,  and 
the  throne  of  grace  to  which  he  should  now  go.  What  can  he 
say  to  God  when  he  would  pray  to  Him  J  Confess  his  sins  ?  No  ~ 
he  does  not  at  present  feel  the  act  to  be  sinful.  Thank  God  for 
giving  him  access  to  such  follies?  He  has  his  doubts  whether  God 
approves  of  all  that  has  been  done.  But  he  may  ask  God's  bless- 
ing? No,  he  is  scarcely  disposed  to  acknowledge  that  he  needs  a 
blessing,  or  he  doubts  whether  the  blessing  would  be  given.  The 
practical  conclusion  to  which  he  eomes  is,  that  it  may  be 
as  consistent  in  him  to  betake  himself  to  sleep  without  offer- 
ing to  God  what  he  feels  would  only  be  a  mockery.  What 
is  he  to  do  the  following  morning  ?  It  is  a  critical  time.  Con- 
fess his  error?  No;  with  the  recollection  of  fehe  gay  scene  in. 
which  he  mingled,  and  with  the  taste  and  relish  of  it  yet  upon  his 
palate,  he  is  not  prepared  to  acknowledge  his  folly.  Morning  and 
evening  now  go  and  return,  and  bring  new  gifts  from  God,  and 
new  manifestations  of  his  goodness;  but  no  acknowledgment  of 
the  Divine  bounty  on  the  part  of  him  who  is  yet  ever  receiving  it, 
No  doubt  there  are  times  when  he  is  prompted  to  prayer  by  power- 


AND    FURTHERING    SPIRITUAL    ENDS.  231 

ful  feelings,  called  up  by  outward  trials  or  inward  convictions. 
But  ever  when  the  storms  of  human  life  would  drive  him  to  the 
shore,  there  is  a  tide  beating  him  back.  His  course  continues  to 
be  a  very  vacillating  one — now  seeming  to  approach  to  God,  and 
anon  driven  farther  from  him,  till  he  obtains  from  books  or  from 
lectures  a  smattering  of  half-understood  science.  He  now  learns 
that  all  things  are  governed  by  laws  regular  and  fixed,  over  which 
the  breath  of  prayer  can  exert  as  little  influence,  as  they  move  on 
in  their  allotted  course,  as  the  passing  breeze  of  the  earth  over  the 
sun  in  his  circuit.  False  philosophy  has  now  come  to  the  aid  of 
guilty  feelings,  and  hardens  their  cold  waters  into  an  icicle  lying 
at  his  very  heart,  cooling  all  his  ardor,  and  damping  all  his  en- 
thusiasm. He  looks  back  at  times,  no  doubt,  to  the  simple  faith 
of  his  childhood  with  a  sigh;  but  it  is  as  to  a  pleasing  dream  or 
illusion,  from  which  he  has  been  awakened,  and  into  which,  the 
spell  being  broken,  he  can  never  fall  again. 

We  must,  therefore,  seek  for  a  firmer  basis  on  which  to  rest  the 
duty  of  prayer. 

Thirdly,  Prayer  is  a  duty  which  we  owe  to  God.  The  intelli- 
gent creature  feels  it  to  be  due  on  his  part  that  he  should  thus 
exalt  the  Creator.  Common  gratitude  will  prompt  every  thank- 
ful mind  to  express  its  sense  of  the  Divine  goodness.  Every  re- 
proach of  conscience  should  bring  us  down  upon  our  knees  before 
that  God  whose  law  we  have  broken.  Prayer,  ':  uttered  or  un- 
expressed,"' is  the  form  which  this  duty  of  obeisance,  which  we  hold 
to  be  a  moral  duty,  should  assume.  It  is  man,  in  his  own  way, 
and  according  to  his  nature,  addressing  himself  to  God,  who,  ac- 
cording to  his  nature,  must  hear  and  listen  to  the  petitions  of  his 
creatures.  There  may  be  prayer  where  there  are  no  words  em- 
ployed, and  the  heart  may  move  when  the  lips  do  riot  move.  Still, 
it  is  according  to  the  constitution  of  man  that  out  of  the  abun- 
dance of  the  heart  the  mouth  will  speak ;  and  words,  while  form- 
ing no  essential  part  of  the  prayer,  will  yet  essentially  aid  it,  by 
keeping  the  mind  from  falling  into  blankness  and  vacuity,  by  insti- 
gating and  guiding  it  in -a  certain  train — in  short,  they  supply  a 
censer  in  which  the  delicate  incense  of  our  feelings  may  be  pre- 
sented before  the  Lord. 

Fourthly,  God  has  so  arranged  his  providence  that  he  provides 
an  answer  to  prayer.  It  is  of  the  utmost  moment  to  establish 
this  truth,  and  to  show  that  there  is  a  means  by  which  God  can 


METHOD    OP    ANSWERING    PRAYER, 

answer  prayer  in  a  manner  worthy  of  his  own  character,  and 
suited  to  ours. 

A  late  distinguished  Christian  philosopher  has  treated  this  sub- 
ject with  his  usual  enlargement  of  mind.  He  supposes  that 
prayer  may  be  answered  in  one  or  other  of  two  ways,  in  perfect 
accordance  with  the  ordinary  procedure  of  God.  He  supposes 
that  prayer  and  its  answer  may  be  connected  together,  as  cause 
and  effect,  that  they  may  form  a  sequence  of  a  very  subtle  kind, 
more  subtle  than  any  of  the  sequences  of  the  most  latent  physical 
substances,  and  not,  therefore,  observable  except  by  those  who 
have  that  nice  spiritual  discernment  which  is  communicated  by 
faith.  Or,  he  supposes,  that  God  may  interpose  among  the  phy- 
sical agents  beyond  that  limit  to  which  human  sagacity  can  trace 
the  operation  of  law.  He  calls  on  us  to  observe  how  in  all 
human  affairs  we  can  follow  the  actual  agency  of  law  but  a  very 
little  way  back.  These  laws,  as  we  follow  them,  become  so  com- 
plicated in  their  operation,  that  God  might  easily  interfere  with 
them,  and  change  them,  without  the  possibility  of  his  presence 
being  detected.  He  might,  for  instance,  change  the  laws  which 
regulate  the  weather,  and  send  a  storm  or  calm  at  any  given 
place  or  time;  or  he  might  modify  the  laws  by  which  the  living 
functions  of  the  human  body  are  regulated,  and  send  health  or 
disease,  and  no  man  be  able  to  say  whether  there  has  been  an 
interposition  or  not. 

We  are  unwilling  to  cast  a  shade  of  doubt  upon  these  beautiful 
views.  It  does  seem,  however,  as  if  the  first  were  scarcely  con- 
sistent with  the  correct  idea  of  prayer.  To  suppose  that  there  is 
a  causal  connection  does  not  leave  that  discretion  to  the  Divine 
mind  in  answering  prayer,  which  it  is  most  needful  that  he  should 
exercise.  Nor  does  the  analogy  of  nature  furnish  us  with  a  sin- 
gle instance  of  a  mental  feeling  causally  influencing  an  object  or 
event  with  which  it  has  no  physical  connection.  It  may  be  safely 
said  of  the  second  view,  that  it  never  can  be  directly  disproved. 
It  takes  us  into  a  region  in  which,  if  proof  cannot  easily  be  dis- 
covered, it  is  certain  that  disproof  cannot  be  found.  Both  theories 
may  be  fairly  held  as  serving  the  purpose  intended  by  their  author, 
and  as  showing  that  it  is  possible  for  God  to  answer  prayer.  It  is 
a  favorite  maxim  with  Dr.  Chalmers,  and  one  of  some  importance, 
that  an  hypothesis  may  be  fitted,  when  it  serves  no  other  purpose, 
to  take  the  edge  off  a  plausible  argument.  The  objector,  in  this 
case,  insists  (as  his  major  proposition  in  the  syllogism)  that  God 


AND    FURTHERING    SPIRITUAL    ENDS.  233 

cannot  answer  prayer  in  consistency  with  his  usual  method  of 
procedure ;  and  Dr.  Chalmers  deprives  this  general  proposition, 
and  therefore  the  conclusion,  of  all  force,  by  showing  that  there 
are  at  least  two  conceivable  ways  by  which  God  can  grant  the 
requests  of  his  creatures  in  perfect  accordance  with  all  the  prin- 
ciples of  his  Providence. 

But  is  it  necessary  to  resort  to  either  of  these  ingenious  theo- 
ries ?  Is  there  not  a  more  obvious  means  by  which  God  can  an- 
swer the  prayer  of  faith?  It  is  not  necessary  to  suppose  that 
prayer  and  its  answer  form  a  separate  law  of  nature,  for  the  an- 
swer may  come  as  the  result  of  other  laws  arranged  for  this  very 
purpose.  Nor  is  it  needful  to  suppose  that  God  interposes  to 
change  his  own  laws.  The  analogy  of  his  method  of  operation 
in  other  matters  would  rather  incline  us  to  believe  (hat  he  has  so 
arranged  these  laws,  that  by  their  agency  he  may  answer  prayer 
without  at  all  interfering  with  them.  We  have  been  endeavoring 
to  develop  the  plan  of  the  Divine  Providence  by  which  he  may 
be  enabled  to  secure  this  end.  His  agents  were  at  first  ordained 
and  marshalled  by  him  for  the  accomplishment  of  all  the  wiser 
designs  of  his  government;  and  among  other  ends,  they  may 
bring  the  blessings  for  which  faith  is  expected  to  supplicate.  He 
sends  an  answer  to  prayer  in  precisely  the  same  way  as  he  com- 
passes all  his  other  moral  designs,  in  the  same  manner  as  he  con- 
veys his  blessings  and  inflicts  his  judgments.  He  does  not 
require  to  interfere  with  his  own  arrangements  in  order  to  answer 
prayer,  for  there  is  an  answer  provided  in  the  arrangement  which 
he  has  made  from  all  eternity.  How  is  it  that  God  sends  us  the 
bounties  of  his  Providence  ? — how  is  it  that  he  supplies  the  many 
wants  of  his  creatures  ? — how  is  it  that  he  encourages  industry  ? 
—how  is  it  that  he  arrests  the  plots  of  wickedness  ? — how  is  it 
that  he  punishes  in  this  life  notorious  offenders  against  his  law? 
The  answer  is,  by  the  skilful  pre-arrangements  of  his  Providence, 
whereby  the  needful  events  fall  out  at  the  very  time  and  in  the 
very  way  required.  When  the  question  is  asked,  How  does  God 
answer  prayer?  we  give  the  very  same  reply, — it  is  by  the  pre- 
ordained appointment  of  God,  when  he  settled  the  constitution 
of  the  world,  and  set  all  its  parts  in  order. 

There  is  nothing  here  opposed  to  the  principles  of  the  Divine 
government,  but  everything  in  consonance  with  them.  We  have, 
in  a  previous  section,  shown  how  events  may  be  joined  by  a 
natural  tie,  by  a  moral  tie,  or  a  religious  tie.  In  regard  to  the 


234  METHOD    OF    ANSWERING    PRAYER, 

natural  tie,  we  have  shown  that  in  nature  there  are  beautiful 
relations  in  the  works  of  God,  not  originating  in  any  causal 
connection.  Again,  we  have  hinted  that  we  may  expect  God  to 
support  his  moral  law  by  his  physical  government.  The  illus- 
tration of  this  subject  will  yet  pass  under  our  notice.  Meanwhile, 
we  would  have  it  observed,  that  prayer  and  its  answer  may  be 
held  as  connected  by  a  religious  tie.  Prayer,  we  have  seen,  is  a 
duty  which  man,  in  his  present  state,  owes  to  his  Creator.  Man 
is  a  religious  as  well  as  a  moral  being.  There  are  important  re- 
lations between  man  and  his  Maker,  originating,  no  doubt,  in  mo- 
rality in  its  widest  sense,  but  rising  far  above  a  mere  commonplace 
virtue.  Now,  just  as  God  supports  his  moral  law  by  the  arrange- 
ments and  coincidences  of  his  physical  Providence,  so  we  may 
expect  him  also  to  support  his  spiritual  government  by  the  same 
means.  We  must  ever  hold  the  physical,  as  the  inferior,  to  be 
subordinated  to  the  moral  and  the  spiritual,  and  we  expect  it  to 
be  employed  to  uphold  these  as  the  end.  Just  as  he  has  arranged 
his  Providence,  as  all  thinking  minds  acknowledge,  to  encourage 
virtue  and  discountenance  vice,  we  anticipate  that  by  the  same 
agency  he  may  also  provide  an  answer  to  prayer.  And  it  is  a 
fact  that  all  who  have  continued  steadfast  in  the  prayer  of  faith 
have  declared,  as  the  result  of  their  experience,  that  God  has  not 
failed  on  his  part,  but  has  given  them  an  answer  to  their  suppli- 
cations. 

And  we  reckon  it  a  presumption  in  favor  of  the  view  now  ex- 
pounded, that  it  leaves  the  laws  of  nature  undisturbed,  not  only 
within,  but  beyond  the  limit  at  which  human  observation  ceases. 
Geology  and  astronomy  conspire  to  inform  us  that  there  is  a  uni- 
formity of  law  throughout  the  widest  regions  of  time  and  space. 
It  seems  as  if,  throughout  all  knowable  time  and  space,  there  was 
a  government  by  general  laws,  which  others  as  well  as  the  human 
race  may  observe  and  act  upon.  The  parts  of  the  great  Cosmos 
are  so  connected,  that  irremediable  evil  might  follow  the  interfer- 
ence with  law,  even  though  that  interference  should  be  beyond 
the  limit  of  human  observation.  We  cannot  conceive  it  to  be  for 
the  mere  good  of  man  that  general  law  has  reigned  throughout 
the  long  eras  of  the  history  of  the  earth  before  man  peopled  it,  or 
or  that  it  reigns  in  the  distant  regions  of  space,  of  which  he  can 
take  but  a  bare  cognizance.  Other  ends  must  be  served  by  this 
universality  of  law ;  and  we  are  not  willing  to  suppose  that  it 
ceases  at  the  point  at  which  man's  eye  must  cease  to  follow  it 


AND    FURTHERING    SPIRITUAL    ENDS.  835 

Every  new  discovery  in  science  widens  the  dominions  of  law,  and 
we  are  not  convinced  that  the  interests  of  religion  require  us  to 
limit  them.  Altogether,  when  there  is  a  way  by  which  God  can 
answer  prayer  without  disturbing  his  own  laws,  it  is  safest  to  con- 
clude that  this  is  the  actual  method  employed. 

No  objection  can  be  brought  against  this  view,  from  the  Divine 
immutability  or  the  doctrine  of  predestination,  which  will  not  ap- 
ply so  extensively  as  to  reduce  it  to  an  absurdity.  (Reductio  ad 
absurdmn.)  Since  God  is  unchangeable,  and  has  arranged  eve- 
rything beforehand,  why  need  I  pray  at  all?  The  reply  is — that 
the  answer  to  prayer  proceeds  on  the  foreseen  circumstance  that 
the  prayer  will  be  offered,  and  that  if  the  man  refuses  to  pray,  he 
shall  assuredly  find  it  fixed  that  no  answer  is  given.  If  petu 
lance  insists  on  a  farther  reply,  we  think  it  enough  to  show  tha' 
this  is  a  style  of  objection  which  would  apply  to  every  species  of 
human  activity.  Why  need  I  be  industrious,  if  it  is  arranged 
whether  or  no  I  shall  get  the  object  which  I  expect  to  gain  by  in- 
dustry ?  is  the  next  form  which  the  cavil  may  assume.  If  the 
objector  is  an  ambitious  man,  we  ask,  why  pursue  so  eagerly  that 
expected  honor  when  he  knows  that  it  has  been  ordained,  from 
all  eternity,  whether  he  shall  secure  it  or  no?  If  he  is  a  man  of 
pleasure,  we  ask,  why  such  anxiety  to  .procure  never-ceasing  mirth 
and  amusement,  when  he  knows  that  it  is  pre-determined  what 
amount  of  enjoyment  he  is  to  receive  in  this  life?  Ah  !  it  turns 
out  that  the  objection,  which  presses  with  no  peculiar  force  upon 
the  supposed  Divine  arrangements  in  regard  to  prayer,  is  a 
mere  pretext  to  excuse  the  unwillingness  of  the  man  who  urges 
it,  for  he  discovers  it  only  in  those  cases  in  which  he  is  unwilling 
to  act.  • 

There  appears  to  us  to  be  a  beautiful  congruity  in  this  method 
of  answering  prayer.  Prayer  is  effectually  answered,  and  yet 
.there  is  no  room  for,  or  encouragement  to  any  possible  evils,  such 
as  pride,  self-confidence,  and  indolent  self-complacency  and  inac- 
tivity. If  prayer  and  its  answers  were  connected  as  cause  and 
effect,  there  might  be  a  risk,  that  when  the  person  had  prayed  he 
would  rashly  conclude,  that  exertion  could  not  be  necessary.  But 
in  the  system  now  developed,  while  there  is  assuredly  a  connection 
between  prayer  and  its  answers,  it  is  not  a  connection  in  the  me- 
chanical laws  of  nature,  but  in  the  counsels  of  God  ;  and  the  man 
who  has  prayed,  as  he  looks  for  the  answer,  feels  that  he  must  fall 
in  with  the  Divine  procedure.  There  is  a  wholesome  discipline 


236  METHOD    OF    ANSWERING    PRAYER, 

exercised  by  the  very  uncertainty  (humanly  speaking)  of  the 
means  which  God  employs  for  sending  the  answer,  and  the  man 
who  has  prayed  is  kept  humble  and  dependent,  and  in  the  exercise 
of  a  spirit  of  waiting  and  watchfulness.  He  feels  that  he  dare  be 
proud  and  presumptuous,  only  at  the  risk  of  defeating  all  the  pur- 
poses served  by  his  acts  of  devotion.  He  sees  that,  on  ceasing  to 
be  active,  God  may  probably  punish  him  for  his  folly  by  laying  an 
arrest  on  the  expected  answer  to  his  petitions. 

It  is  another  congruity  of  this  method  of  Providence  that  God 
can  so  join  prayer  with  its  answer,  that  while  the  connection  is 
not  observable  by  his  neighbors,  it  may  be  traced  by  the  man  him- 
self. There  is  an  obvious  propriety  in  such  a  provision  being 
made  in  so  delicate  a  matter  as  the  soul's  communion  with  its 
Maker.  We  may  observe  the  same  principles  in  other  dealings 
of  God's  providence.  The  individual  can  see  many  adaptations  to 
himself  in  the  events  which  are  occurring,  as,  for  instance,  in  the 
afflictive  dispensations  of  Divine  Providence,  but  which  are  hid 
from  the  eyes  of  others.  There  is  a  special  propriety,  as  it  appears 
to  us,  in  the  answer  to  prayer  being  conveyed  in  this  way,  as  a 
token  to  the  man  himself,  but  which  he  is  not  ostentatiously  to 
display  before  the  world,  and  thereby  proclaim  himself  a  favorite 
of  heaven.  By  the  nicely  fitted  machinery  of  his  providence,  God 
can  connect  the  prayer  and  its  answer  by  threads  which  are  all 
but  invisible  to  others,  but  which  are  clearly  discerned  by  the  mail 
himself. 

The  same  general  rules  that  guide  us  in  looking  for  an  answer 
to  prayer  also  guide  us  in  determining  the  exceptions.  It  is  not 
our  prayer  that  produces  the  blessing,  by  its  inherent  power,  but  it 
comes  by  the  special  appointment  of  God,  and  so  we  look  for  an 
answer  only  when  the  request  is  agreeable  to  the  will  of  heaven. 
We  always  leave  a  discretion  in  the  hands  of  God  ;  and  every 
man  who  knows  himself,  and  the  perversity  of  his  desires,  will  re- 
joice that  there  is  a  discretion  in  the  hands  of  God,  and  that  he 
does  not  promise  to  answer  all  our  prayers.  We  see,  too,  how 
there  is  a  discretion  left  with  God,  not  only  as  to  whether  he  will 
send  the  blessing,  but  as  to  the  time,  the  manner,  and  means,  in 
respect  of  all  which  the  soul  is  not  to  dictate  to  Deity,  but  patiently 
to  wait  upon  his  pleasure.  Nor  should  it  be  forgotten  that  the  tie 
that  connects  the  prayer  and  its  answer  is  a  religious  tie ;  and  we 
are  thus  reminded,  that  it  is  only  when  the  prayer  is  spiritual  that 
it  can  be  expected  to  bring  with  it  the  anticipated  blessings. 


AND    FURTHERING    SPIRITUAL    ENDS.  237 

Nor  should  it  be  overlooked,  that  by  these  skilful  arrangements, 
God  can  not  only  answer  prayer,  but  answer  it  in  such  an  oppor- 
tuneness of  time,  place,  and  manner,  that  when  the  blessing  comes, 
it  is  as  if  it  had  dropped  immediately  from  heaven.  God  delays 
the  answer  that  it  may  be  the  more  beneficent  when  it  comes. 
The  stream  is  made  to  turn  and  wind,  that  it  may  receive  contri- 
butions from  every  valley  which  it  passes,  and  all  to  flow  more 
largely  into  the  bosom  at  last.  God's  plans  ripen  slowly,  that  the 
fruit  may  be  the  richer  and  mellower.  Hence  it  is  that  the  royal 
munificence  of  his  bounty  knows  no  limits  at  last.  "  He  is  able 
to  do  exceeding  abundantly  above  all  that  we  ask  or  think." 

Fifthly,  Prayer  has  a  most  beneficent  reflex  influence  upon  the 
character.  We  are  unwilling  that  the  obligation  of  prayer  should 
be  made  to  rest  primarily  on  such  a  basis.  But  an  independent 
basis  being  secured  otherwise,  it  is  indeed  most  delightful  to  trace 
the  blessed  influence  which  prayer  produces  upon  the  character. 
We  must  first  show  how  it  shines  in  its  own  light,  and  then  it  is 
pleasant  to  observe  how  its  light  is  reflected  from  off  the  heart 
and  temper,  which  it  beautifies  and  adorns.  Prayer,  like  virtue, 
should  not  be  courted  for  its  mere  indirect  consequences ;  but 
when  sought  for  its  own  sake,  it  brings  with  it  a  thousand  other 
blessings. 

Combine  these  five  considerations,  the  two  presumptions  in  the 
feeling  and  state  of  man,  the  two  direct  proofs  in  the  duty  of  prayer 
and  the  appointed  connection  with  its  answer,  and  the  accessory 
in  the  results  that  follow,  and  we  have  a  foundation  on  which 
prayer  may  rest,  and  from  which  it  can  never  be  dislodged. 

The  observations  made  on  the  subject  of  the  answer  to  prayer 
hold  true  of  all  other  spiritual  ends  contemplated  by  God.  Whether 
the  mere  observer  of  physical  nature  notices  it  or  no,  we  doubt 
not  but  the  earth  is  meant  to  help  the  woman,  that  the  physical 
is  used  to  help  on  the  spiritual,  which  is  to  be  last  and  greatest  of 
all  the  historical  developments  produced  by  God  in  our  world.  But 
the  discussion  of  this  subject  would  conduct  us  into  a  far  higher 
field  of  inquiry  than  the  common  providence  of  God ;  and  we  wish 
it  to  be  understood,  that  in  these  sections  we  are  treating  of  the 
ordinary  dealings  of  God  in  the  world,  and  not  of  the  supernatural 
government  of  his  Church. 


CHAPTER   III. 

RELATION  OF  THE  PROVIDENCE  OF  GOD  TO  THE 
CHARACTER  OF  MAN. 

SECTION  I—GENERAL  REMARKS  ON  THE  RELATION  OF  THE  PHYSI- 
CAL TO  THE  MORAL  PROVIDENCE  OF  GOD. 

Two  truths,  regarding  man's  moral  nature,  stand  out  as  among 
the  most  firmly  established  of  all  that  are  revealed  by  the  consci- 
ousness— the  one,  that  there  is  an  essential  distinction  between 
good  and  evil ;  and  the  other,  that  the  moral  is  higher  in  its  very 
nature  than  the  physical.  Place  before  the  mind  two  actions — the 
one  morally  good,  and  the  other  morally  evil ;  the  one,  let  us  sup- 
pose, a  truthful  declaration,  uttered  by  a  person  tempted  to  equivo- 
cate ;  and  the  other,  a  falsehood  deliberately  uttered ;  and  the 
mind  in  judging  of  them  at  once  and  authoritatively  proclaims 
that  there  is  a  difference.  Again,  place  before  the  mind  a  moral 
good  and  a  physical  good — say  the  furtherance  of  a  nation's  virtue 
on  the  one  hand,  and  the  production  of  some  beautiful  piece  of  art 
on  the  other,  and  the  mind  is  prepared  to  decide  that  the  former 
is  immeasurably  the  higher. 

Assuming,  then,  that  there  is  a  moral  good,  and  that  the  moral 
is  higher  than  the  physical,  let  us  now  look  at  the  connection 
between  them.  That  there  is  such  a  connection,  we  hold  to  be 
one  of  the  most  firmly  established  of  the  truths  which  relate  to 
the  government  of  God.  The  God  who  hath  established  both, 
hath  established  a  relation  between  them. 

There  is  nothing  unreasonable  or  improbable  in  the  idea,  that 
God  should  connect  one  part  of  his  government  with  another. 
Every  person  acknowledges  that  the  physical  is  used  to  promote 
the  sentient  arid  the  intellectual  in  man's  nature — that  is,  the  ex- 
ternal world  is  so  arranged  as  to  minister  to  man's  happiness  and 
comfort,  and  to  help  on  his  growth  in  knowledge  and  intelligence. 
We  have  been  at  pains  to  point  out  what  we  consider  as  among 


THE    MORAL    PROVIDENCE    OF    GOD.  239 

the  most  striking  instances  of  this  latter  kind  of  adaptation.  We 
have  also  shown  that  there  may  be  fine  threads  connecting  the 
physical  with  the  spiritual.  But  there  is  a  no  less  curious,  though 
perhaps  in  some  respects  a  more  complex  relation,  between  the 
physical  and  the  moral — the  physical,  as  the  lesser,  being  always 
regarded  as  subordinated  to  the  moral,  as  infinitely  the  greater. 
The  physical  events  of  providence  have  most  assuredly  a  bearing 
upon  the  character  of  man. 

Can  we  be  wrong  in  supposing  that,  if  man  had  been  a  being 
spotlessly  pure,  God  would  have  governed  him  by  a  moral  law, 
producing  the  same  harmony  throughout  the  world  of  mind  as 
physical  law  does  in  the  world  of  matter?  It  is  conceivable  that 
in  such  a  world  the  whole  marshalling  of  the  divine  plans  would 
have  been  clear  and  orderly,  as  the  arrangements  of  a  well- 
regulated  family,  all  the  members  of  which  love  one  another,  and 
iove  their  head.  The  physical  would  have  been  so  ordered,  as 
to  serve  the  same  purposes  with  those  kind  rewards  and  en- 
couragements, which  parents  are  ever  giving  to  their  obedient 
children. 

But  man,  it  is  evident,  is  not  habitually  guided  by  any  such 
moral  principle.  Take  any  rule,  the  loosest  and  most  earthly, 
purporting  to  be  a  moral  law,  and  examine  mankind  by  H,  and  we 
are  constrained  to  acknowledge  that  they  are  not  obeying  it. 
Such  being  the  character  of  man,  it  is  to  be  expected  that  the 
government  of  the  world  should  be  suited  to  it.  It  is  question- 
able jf  the  mode  of  government  best  fitted  for  holy  beings  is  at 
all  adapted  to  those  who  have  broken  loose  from  the  restraints  of 
moral  principle.  When  a  father  finds  his  children  rebelling 
against  him,  and  setting  his  authority  at  defiance,  he  must  regu- 
late his  family  on  totally  different  principles  from  those  adopted 
when  the  bonds  that  connected  the  members  were  confidence  and 
love.  God  cannot  in  any  case  abandon  the  government  of  any 
portion  of  his  own  universe,  and  when  he  cannot  rule  by  moral 
laws,  he  must  needs  curb  by  physical  restraint. 

But  in  pursuing  this  course  of  reflection,  we  are  in  danger,  it 
must  be  acknowledged,  of  outrunning  the  premises  as  yet  estab- 
lished. We  find  ourselves  looking  into  the  purpose  supposed  to 
be  served  by  them,  before  determining  the  facts  themselves.  We 
now  proceed  in  this  chapter  to  establish  one  of  the  facts,  and  to 
show  that  God's  providence  is  intimately  connected  with  the  moral 
character  of  man  ;  and  in  particular,  that  God  lays  restraints  upon 


240  CONTROL  WHICH    GOD    HAS    OVER    MAN 

human  sinfulness  and  folly,  by  skilful  arrangements  meeting  and 
conspiring  for  this  purpose.  It  must  be  left  to  a  subsequent  part 
of  this  Treatise  to  establish  another  fact,  furnishing  ihe  other  pre- 
mise, namely,  that  man's  character  is  sinful.  From  the  two 
premises  when  fully  established,  we  arrive  at  a  discovery  of  the 
means  adopted  by  God  to  govern  a  fallen  world  in  which  the  moral 
law  has  lost  its  power,  and  perceive  how  he  can  bind  by  physical 
chains  those  who  have  broken  loose  from  the  gentler  ties  of  affec- 
tion and  moral  obligation.  So  far  as  we  seem  to  stretch  the  argu- 
ment beyond  this  point  in  this  chapter,  it  is  to  be  understood  as 
merely  presumptive.  It  is  not  conclusive  till  it  is  furnished  with 
the  counterpart  fact  to  be  discovered  by  that  inquiry  into  man's 
moral  principles,  which  we  purpose  to  undertake  in  the  Book 
which  follows. 

SECTION  IL— CONTROL  WHICH  GOD  HAS  OVER  MAN  BY  MEANS  OF 
PHYSICAL  ARRANGEMENTS. 

It  is  good  for  man  to  consider  how  dependent  he  is  rendered  by 
the  arrangements  of  Divine  Providence.  Not  that  he  is  to  be  re- 
garded, after  the  representations  of  some  silly  theorists  of  our  day, 
as  the  mere  creature  of  circumstances,  his  character  taking  its  hue 
like  his  skin  from  the  climate  in  which  he  lives,  or  like  the  insect 
from  the  food  by  which  it  is  nourished.  Man  is  conscious  that  he 
has  a  judgment  and  will  of  his  own,  involving  him  in  deep  re- 
sponsibility, as  the  true  determining  causes  of  his  conduct.  But 
while  man's  will  and  accountability  remain  untouched,  God  has 
means  of  accomplishing  HIS  WILL,  and  that  with  or  without  the 
concurrence  of  man's  will.  While  men's  thoughts  and  affections 
and  volitions  are  all  free,  God  has  a  thousand  ways  of  directing, 
or  of  thwarting,  if  need  be,  their  purposes,  and  turning  them  to- 
wards the  accomplishment  of  his  own  plans  of  infinite  wisdom. 

What  a  number  of  laws,  many  of  them  as  yet  unexplained,  are 
to  be  found  in  our  bodily  frames,  and  how  curiously  are  they  con- 
nected. This  complicated  organism  and  net-work  of  the  body  is 
one  most  effectual  means  of  rendering  man  dependent  on  the  ar- 
rangements of  Providence.  Every  one  part  of  the  frame  is  so 
closely  connected  with  every  other,  that  the  least  derangement  in 
any  one  may  render  all  the  rest  useless.  How  extensive  the  train 
of  powers  in  exercise  before  we  can  move  a  single  member  of  the 
body.  How  vast  an  apparatus  of  bones,  muscles,  and  nerves 
must  be  in  action  before  I  can  grasp  the  pen  which  I  now  hold, 


BY    MEANS    OF    PHYSICAL    ARRANGEMENTS.  241 

or  write  this  sentence;  and  what  a  number  of  substances — light, 
humours,  muscles,  and  nerves,  must  be  in  their  proper  state  and 
relation  before  any  one  can  read  it.  Sir  Charles  Bell  has  written 
a  whole  volume  upon  the  hand ;  and  similar  works  might  be  com- 
posed on  other  parts  of  the  body,  not  less  wonderfully  fashioned. 
The  laws  of  the  principle  of  life,  of  the  brain,  of  the  nervous 
system,  of  the  muscles,  of  the  bones,  of  the  lungs,  of  the  heart,  the 
liver,  and  other  vital  functions,  must  all  be  in  healthy  operation, 
in  order  to  constant  and  well-regulated  activity  on  the  part  of  man. 
Let  any  one  of  these  powers  or  organs  be  seriously  injured,  and 
weakness  and  disease,  or  even  death  may  follow.  Every  one 
knows,  too,  how  much  the  temper,  the  sensibilities,  the  floating 
impulses  and  notions,  nay,  the  very  talents  and  opinions  of  men, 
and  through  these  their  whole  character  are  determined  by  the 
bodily  temperament.  He  who  is  the  disposer,  as  well  as  the 
maker  of  all,  can  use  any  one  of  these  agents  for  the  arresting  of 
the  most  skilfully  devised  of  human  schemes,  at  the  very  instant 
of  execution  ;  and  through  all  of  them,  he  can  command  and 
control  the  destinies  of  the  race,  and  make  the  very  wrath  of  man 
to  praise  him,  and  restrain  the  remainder  of  wrath. 

But  God  has  not  only  the  means  of  governing  and  restraining 
man  within  his  own  frame,  he  has  unnumbered  agents  in  other 
departments,  connecting  themselves  more  or  less  immediately  with 
man's  condition.  How  closely  does  man's  very  existence,  not  to 
gpeak  of  his  comforts,  depend  on  the  state  of  the  physical  world 
around  him.  Hearken  to  the  natural  philosopher  as  he  explains 
the  various  laws  of  the  air  and  water,  which  serve  such  purposes 
in  the  economy  of  human  life  ;  and  to  the  chemist,  as  he  analyzes 
the  component  parts  of  our  breath  and  food ;  consider  how  every 
plant  or  mineral  that  is  used  as  medicine  may  spare  life  or  hasten 
death  ;  how  much  the  weather,  depending  on  so  many  compli- 
cated meteorological  laws,  may  help  or  mar  our  projects  ;  how  our 
clothing,  and  the  furniture  of  our  dwellings,  brought  from  many 
an  island  and  continent,  may  exert  an  influence  upon  our  com- 
forts, our  health,  and  the  length  of  our  life  ;  and  how  there  are 
agents,  such  as  electricity  and  heat,  announcing  themselves  mys- 
teriously, without  deigning  to  give  any  insight  into  their  nature  ; 
reflect,  too,  on  the  combinations  which  can  be  made  of  all  these 
powers,  and  we  are  constrained  to  acknowledge  how  helpless 
man  must  become,  when  it  is  the  will  of  God  to  make  him 
helpless. 

16 


242  CONTROL    WHICH    GOD    HAS    OVER    MAN 

Add  to  all  this  the  dependence  of  every  man  upon  others  of  hiar 
species.  Even  Robinson  Crusoe  was  dependent  on  other  men  for 
his  gun,  which  may  have  employed  many  a  hand  in  constructing' 
its  several  parts.  The  greater  portion  of  mankind  are  dependent 
more  or  less  on  a  vast  number  of  other  men.  We  should  consider, 
too,  how  these  other  men  on  whom  we  depend  are  as  dependent 
as  ourselves  on  others  of  the  race.  It  would  appear  as  if  there 
was  so  little  coherence  in  society,  so  little  of  true  affection  or 
righteous  principle  to  band  the  members  which  compose  it  to- 
gether, that  they  have  to  be  made  to  stand  like  piles  of  dead  wood 
(so  different  from  living  trees)  by  leaning  upon  each  other.  What 
dreadful  catastrophes  follow,  and  what  a  confounding  of  human 
wisdom  when  God  removes  any  of  these  supports,  and  allows  the 
fabric  to  fall  by  its  own  instability. 

May  we  not  discover  a  reason  in  some  of  the  considerations 
now  urged  for  the  shortening  of  the  lives  of  mankind  after  the 
flood  of  Noah?  For  wise  reasons,  all  of  which  we  may  never  be 
able  to  discover,  but  one  of  which  no  doubt  was  the  lengthening 
of  human  experience,  and  the  handing  down  of  the  results  of  it 
to  future  generations,  God  saw  fit  to  allot  to  mankind  a  longer 
earthly  existence  in  the  early  ages  of  the  world.  And  until  such 
time  as  mankind  became  numerous,  had  learned  the  art  of  com- 
bination, and  were  disposed  to  spurn  at  all  moral  restraint,  there 
might  be  some  measure  of  order  and  peace  produced  by  God,  even 
in  a  wicked  world  where  men  lived  till  nearly  the  age  of  1000 
years.  But  when  the  race  had  learned  the  arts,  when  they  knew 
how  to  unite  in  their  daring  and  ambitious  schemes,  when  the 
sons  of  God,  the  children  of  the  Church,  married  into  the  wicked1 
world,  and  the  restraint  which  the  Church  laid  upon  the  world 
was  removed,  then  it  was  befitting  that  the  existing  dispensation 
should  be  terminated  by  a  flood,  which  swept  away  the  inhabit- 
ants.  The  whole  earth  was  filled  with  violence ;  and  but  for  a 
change  in  the  method  of  government,  this  violence  might  have 
become  beyond  measure  intolerable.  In  the  new  dispensation  of 
things,  the  bow  in  the  cloud  was  a  sign  that  the  earth  should 
not  henceforth  be  visited  by  such  a  catastrophe ;  but  contempo- 
raneously with  it,  and  in  order  to  render  such  an  interposition  no 
longer  needful,  there  was  to  be  a  shortening  of  man's  life,  and  ap- 
parently, too,  a  greater  uncertainty  as  to  the  time  of  the  ap- 
proach of  death.  Man's  gigantic  plans  of  wickedness  were  not 
henceforth  to  be  arrested  by  so  terrible  an  event  aa  the  Flood ; 


BY    MEANS    OF    PHYSICAL  "ARRANGEMENTS.  243 

but.  means,  too,  were  taken  to  prevent  their  schemes  from  attain- 
ing to  so  tremendous  a  magnitude.  May  we  not  discover,  too,  in 
the  confusion  of  tongues  at  Babel,  and  the  consequent  dispersion, 
a  special  arrangement  of  heaven  for  keeping  the  inhabitants  of 
this  world  from  combining  to  produce  such  an  amount  of  disorder 
and  violence  as  must  have  prevented  this  world  from  fulfilling  the 
ends  contemplated  by  its  governor  ? 

It  is  also  worthy  of  being  observed,  that  according  as  persons 
increase  in  influence  in  the  world,  their  dependence  on  others  is 
increased  to  the  same  extent.  In  very  proportion  as  their  rela- 
tions with  others  are  multiplied,  do  they  become  helpless  when 
they  cannot  receive  the  co-operation  which  they  require.  The 
person  spoken  of  as  independent  may  be  dependent  on  no  one  man ; 
but  he  is  thereby,  in  all  probability,  just  rendered  the  more  depen- 
dent on  the  providence  of  God.  The  wealthy  merchant,  the 
manufacturer,  and  the  sovereign  of  extensive  sway— all,  in  short, 
who  are  fitted  to  exercise  a  power  over  the  destinies  of  the  world, 
are  themselves  dependent  on  the  very  persons  and  objects  that  they 
would  rule,  and  these  placed,  it  may  be,  in  widely  distant  coun- 
tries, and  actuated  by  a  thousand  impulses  and  seeming  contin- 
gencies. A  short  time  ago  the  thrones  of  the  most  powerful 
monarchs  in  Europe  were  tottering,  through  the  very  dependence 
of  those  who,  a  few  weeks  previously,  thought  themselves  alto- 
gether independent.  In  the  natural  recoil  of  sentiment  produced 
by  the  evils  necessarily  attendant  in  the  first  instance  on  revolu- 
tions, the  governments  are  now  seeking  to  extricate  themselves 
from  the  abyss  into  which  they  had  been  plunged,  and  are  making 
about  as  simultaneous  an  effort  to  suppress  liberty  and  popular 
rights. 

In  consequence  of  advancing  civilization,  the  ends  of  the  earth 
are  brought  much  nearer  each  other.  It  might  seem  as  if  man- 
kind could  in  consequence  now  combine  the  more  readily  for  the 
accomplishment  of  some  great  end,  fitted,  it  may  be,  to  defeat  the 
Divine  purposes,  like  the  building  of  the  tower  of  Babel,  which 
was  meant  to  keep  the  race  together,  when  it  was  the  purpose  of 
God  to  disperse  them.  But  in  the  very  extension  of  civilization, 
there  are  powers  called  forth  fitted  to  restrain  the  evil  which  that 
extension  might  produce.  In  the  independence  of  thinking  and 
acting  which  advancing  enlightenment  calls  forth,  there  is  a  coun- 
teraction to  the  fatal  influence  exercised  by  individual  men — such 
as  priests,  lawgivers,  and  conquerors,  who  acquired  so  extensive  a 


844  AIDS   TO    VIRTUE,    AND    RESTRAINTS    UPON    VICE. 

sway  in  the  early  ages  of  the  world.  The  age  of  heroes  is  gone 
because  the  world  is  now  too  sagacious  not  to  see  their  ambition 
and  pretence.  In  the  adjustments  of  Divine  providence,  the  very 
pride  and  rivalry  of  mankind  are  made  to  impose  mutual  restraints 
upon  themselves,  and  one  evil  is  made  to  counterbalance  another. 
It  must,  be  acknowledged,  however,  that  while  the  power  of 
great  men  has  diminished,  and  to  all  appearance  must  continue  ta 
lessen,  the  power  of  combination  among  masses  is  greatly  aug- 
mented by  the  intercommunion  of  ideas  and  sentiments.  If 
large  bodies  of  mankind  could  be  made  to  move  under  the  inspira- 
tion of  one  common  principle  or  impulse,  the  effects  produced 
would  be  greater  than  in  the  earlier  ages  of  the  world.  The  in- 
roads of  the  barbarians  upon  the  Roman  empire,  and  the  spread 
of  Mahometanism  in  the  seventh  and  eighth  centuries,  would  be 
insignificant  events  when  compared  with  the  results  which  would 
follow  from  a  similar  impulse,  political  or  religious,  seizing  the 
nations  of  the  earth  in  these  times,  and  alluring  them  on  to  con- 
quest. It  is  possible,  that  before  the  world's  history  closes,  the 
powers  of  evil  may  thus  unite  in  one  grand  effort  and  determina- 
tion to  gain  universal  dominion.  Should  such  an  occurrence  take 
place,  as  seems -very  probable,  it  may  be  safely  predicted  that  the 
movement  will  contain  within  itself  the  seeds  of  its  own  dissolu- 
tion. For  in  very  proportion  as  man's  power  of  swaying  distant 
regions  and  attaining  great  ends  increases,  so  do  the  means  mul- 
tiply by  which  God  can  arrest  human  passion  and  thwart  human 
ambition.  The  ball  as  it  seems  to  gather  strength  and  to  roll  on 
bearing  with  it  its  chilling  atmosphere,  will  be  found  under  an  in- 
fluence from  heaven  to  melt  away  more  suddenly  than  it  has  ap- 
peared. 

SECTION  III.— AIDS  TO  VIRTUE,  AND  RESTRAINTS  UPON  VICE. 

There  is  surely  somewhere  within  the  dominions  of  God  a  world 
in  which  there  is  no  disorder  and  no  violence,  and  in  which  the 
moral  law,  the  royal  law  of  love,  is  sufficient  to  bind  the  intelli- 
gent creatures  to  God,  and  to  one  another.  Account  for  it  as  we 
may,  it  is  evident,  at  the  first  glance  that  our  lot  is  not  cast  in  such 
a  world.  We  find  ourselves  instead,  in  a  state  of  things  in  which 
there  are  much  confusion  and  misery  produced  by  human  wicked- 
ness— this  prorince,  rebellious  though  it  seem,  being  all  the  while 
under  the  discipline  of  God. 


AIDS    TO    VIRTUE,    AND    RESTRAINTS    UPON    VICE.  245 

Possibly  the  problem  which  had  to  be  solved  in  the  counsels  of 
heaven  was— Given  a  world  in  which  the  love  of  holiness  and  the 
hatred  of  sin  do  not  exist,  or  are  at  all  events  very  weak, — to  de- 
termine a  method  of  governing  it,  so  that  it  may  not  run  into  in- 
extricable confusion,  and  destroy  itself  by  its  own  madness  and 
violence  ?  Are  we  living  in  such  a  constitution  of  things  ? 

But  we  are  not  at  present  inquiring  into  the  nature  or  extent  of 
man's  love  of  virtue  or  vice ;  this  is  a  topic  which  falls  to  be  con- 
sidered in  a  subsequent  part  of  this  Treatise,  We  may,  however, 
at  this  stage  of  our  inquiries,  take  a  view  of  the  numerous  means 
which  God  employs  for  the  promotion  of  virtuous,  and  the  restrain- 
ing of  vicious  conduct,  apart  from  any  truly  virtuous  principle  that 
may  lodge  in  the  human  breast. 

I.  There  are  a  great  many  direct  encouragements  given  to  vir- 
tuous, and   restraints  laid  upon   vicious  conduct.     There  is  the 
pleasure  which  the  benevolent  affections  communicate  to  the  mind. 
The  feelings  of  compassion,  good-will,  and  benevolence  are  all  of 
them  pleasing,  and  many  of  them  in  a  high  degree  pleasurable; 
while  malice,  envy,  and  revenge  are  all  harassing  and  painful  in 
their  very  nature.     God  thus  indicates  by  laws,  more  easily  under- 
stood than  those  of  the  best  ordered  kingdoms,  that  he  approves 
of  virtuous  conduct  and  disapproves  of  the  opposite. 

II.  God  has  so  arranged  his  providence,  that  in  the  ordinary  and 
natural  course  of  events,  virtuous  conduct  leads  to  a  multitude  of 
•results  that  are  beneficial  to  the  individual.     The  upright  man  is 
trusted,  and  has  a  thousand  means  of  advancing  his   interests 
denied  to  the  cunning  and  deceitful.     The  friendly  man  receives 
friendship,  which  the  selfish  man  can  never  obtain,  or  enjoy  though 
it  were  granted  to  him.     It  needs  no  deep   reflection   to  discover, 
that  honesty  is  the  best  policy,  and  benevolence  its  own  reward ; 
and  multitudes   act   upon  such   prudential  considerations,  when 
higher  principles  might  fail  to  maintain  any  powerful  influence 
over  them.     If  God  had  constituted  his  government  on  a  different 
principle,  and  so  that  in  the  end  vice  had  been  commonly  success- 
ful, and  productive  of  the  greatest  amount  of  happiness,  truly  we 
know  not  if  there  would  be  any  remains  of  apparent  virtue  among 
the  great  mass  of  mankind.     It  is  certain  that  violence  must  have 
reigned  to  an  extent  which  would  have  made  this  world  altogether 
intolerable,  and  have  rendered  it  a  deed  of  benevolence  on  the  part 
of  God  to  destroy  it  with  all  possible  speed.     But  let  us  not  be  mis- 
understood.    We  do  not  mean  to  assert  that  man  has  nothing  but 


246  AIDS    TO    VIRTUE,    AND    RESTRAINTS    UPOf*  VICE. 

a  cold  and  calculating  selfishness.  We  assume  that  he  has  gen- 
erous and  sympathetic  feelings ;  (we  speak  not  now  of  virtuous 
principle ;)  and  the  aids  to  benevolence  which  God  has  furnished y 
serve  the  same  purposes  as  props  do  to  the  ivy — give  it  bearing 
and  direction ;  and  benevolence,  we  suspecty  would  often  cease 
without  such  a  support  to  lean  on. 

III.  Nor  are  these  the  only  means  which  God  can  employ,  or 
which  he  does  employ,  for  the  correction  of  evil,  and  the  further 
ance  of  that  which  is  good.  He  has  other  and  incidental,  but  still 
most  potent  means  of  furthering  the  same  ends  in  the  cross  dis- 
positions of  his  Providence,  by  which  he  can  arrest  the  purposes 
of  mankind,  and  the  effects  that  would  follow^  at  the  instant  of 
the  design  or  execution.  The  history  of  the  world  is  ever  display- 
ing instances,  in  which  schemes  of  daring  wickedness,  fitted  to 
produce  incalculable  evil,  have  been  staid  in  their  progress  by 
providential  interpositions.  How  often  have  the  judgments  of  God 
visibly  alighted  upon  the  daring  opposers  of  the  will  of  God,  while 
others  have  escaped ;  just  as  the  lightnings  strike  the  bold  cliff 
and  the  lofty  tower,  which  rise  proudly  to  heaven,  while  the  plains 
and  the  lowly  cottages  are  unmolested.  The  death  of  the  Roman 
Emperor  Julian,  when  he  was  bent  upon  the  restoration  of  poly- 
theism, and  on  the  crushing  of  Christianity,  as  yet  adopted  by 
perhaps  a  minority  of  the  empire,  is  one  of  the  many  Providences 
which  every  reflecting  mind  will  discover  in  the  history  of  the 
Church  of  Christ.  On  the  other  hand,  the  good  which  could  not. 
make  way  by  its  own  strength,  has  often  been  helped  on  by  favor- 
ing circumstances.  The  coldest  and  most  secular  historians  are. 
constrained  to  discover  an  overruling  power  in  the  events  which 
furthered  and  hastened  the  great  Reformation.  The  simulta- 
neous, or  all  but  simultaneous  discovery  of  the  magnet,  of  the  art 
of  printing,  of  the  telescope,  and  of  a  new  world,  the  general  re- 
vival of  letters,  and  the  awakening  of  a  keen  spirit  of  inquiry  and 
enterprise,  opened  the  way  for  truths  which  might  not  have  spread 
so  rapidly  by  their  own  inherent  power.  Take  any  great  or 
beneficent  change,  produced  in  the  state  of  the  world,  inquire  into- 
(he  causes  and  occasions  of  it,  and  you  find  a  host  of  conspiring 
agencies  all  tending  to  a  given  point,  and  evidently  under  the 
control  of  a  presiding  mind. 

What  all  men  see  on  a  great  scale  in  the  history  of  the  world 
and  of  great  events,  every  observant  man  must  have  remarked  in 
his  own  little  circle  of  acquaintanceship,  or  in  his  own  personal 


AIDS    TO    VIRTUE,    AND    RESTRAINTS    UPON    VICE.          247 

experience.  Every  man  who  has  watched  the  ways  of  Providence 
must  have  noticed  how  schemes  of  good  were  furthered,  and  at 
last  were  crowned  with  success,  not  so  much  through  their  own 
efficiency  or  excellence,  as  by  the  circumstances  which  favored 
their  development  and  execution.  Almost  all  may  remember  in- 
stances in  which  the  plots  of  cunning  were  disclosed  when  they 
seemed  about  to  be  successful,  or  in  which  the  hand  of  violence, 
was  arrested  when  it  was  lifted  for  action. 

IV.  As  the  aggregate  result  of  the  regulations  of  Providence, 
there  are  groups  of  arrangements  fitted  to  restrain  the  individual 
from  vice,  and  to  cement  society.  The  class  of  arrangements  last 
considered  are  of  an  individual  and  accidental  character,  being  of 
the  nature  of  those  fortuities  which,  as  we  have  seen,  serve  so  im- 
portant a  purpose  in  the  government  of  God,  Those  now  falling 
under  consideration,  are  rather  of  the  nature  of  those  general 
laws,  which,  acting  uniformly,  exercise  a  constant  influence  upon 
the  world.  Like  these  general  laws,  they  are  the  result  of  skil- 
ful adjustments ;  and  being  constant  or  recurrent  after  proper 
intervals,  they  tend  to  bind  mankind  together,  and  to  counterbal- 
ance ever  recurring  evils. 

A  few  instances  out  of  many  that  present  themselves  to  the  ob- 
servant eye  wili  indicate  the  kind  of  means  which  God  employs 
to  keep  human  waywardness  within  bounds.  Look  at  this  quiet 
rural  district  of  our  land,  a  kind  of  peninsula  to  the  contiguous 
world  from  which  it  is  all  but  separated.  There  is  not  an  event 
occurring  in  many  years  to  disturb  the  outward  harmony  which 
visibly  reigns  in  it.  The  citizen  who  retreats  to  it  in  the  season 
of  the  year  when  all  nature  is  smiling,  is  inclined  to  think  that 
this  decorum  must  proceed  from  the  loftiest  principle  and  high- 
toned  religion,  and  concludes  that  he  has  discovered  paradise  still 
lingering  on  our  earth.  Alas  !  you  need  only  a  little  familiar  and 
household  acquaintance  with  the  inhabitants  to  discover  that  there 
are  feuds,  individual  and  family,  raging  in  many  a  bosom.  As 
you  are  initiated  into  the  secrets  of  the  little  world,  you  find  it  to 
be  but  a  miniature  of  the  great  world,  and  there*  are  smouldering 
jealousies,  heartburnings,  and  animosities,  where  you  thought  that 
all  had  been  confidence  and  love.  Whence  then,  you  ask,  this 
pleasing  propriety  and  peaceful  stillness  ?  On  inquiry  you  may 
find  that  there  are  counteracting  influences  in  the  very  evil  agen- 
cies which  are  at  work  in  the  community.  Every  man's  eye  is 
upon  his  neighbor's  character,  and  he  who  exhibits  selfishness, 


248  AIDS    TO    VIRTUE,    AND    RESTRAINTS    UPON    VICE. 

deceit,  or  violence,  instantly  becomes  the  object  of  general  suspicion 
and  dislike.  The  very  curiosity  and  jealousy  so  prying,  which  the 
parties  exercise  towards  one  another,  are  the  means  of  counter- 
acting the  evil  consequences  which  would  follow,  as  the  heat  of 
summer  raises  on  their  mountains  the  moisture  and  the  cloud  to 
moderate  its  scorching  influence. 

Turn  now  to  a  different  scene,  to  one  of  the  closest  lanes  of  a 
crowded  city.  So  far  from  every  man  knowing  his  neighbor's 
character,  there  is  scarcely  any  one  who  knows  his  neighbor's 
name.  You  meet  here  with  none  of  those  backbitings,  and  jealou- 
sies, which  so  fretted  the  other  community,  but  we  miss,  too,  that 
decorum  which  proceeds  from  a  sense  of  character,  and  a  fear  of 
offeuce.  The  personal  and  family  feuds  have  disappeared,  but 
there  have  departed  with  them  all  the  offices  of  kind  and  obliging 
neighhborhood  ;  and  we  are  among  a  population  radically  selfish, 
and  often  malignant,  and  disposed  to  lay  hold  of  every  criminal 
indulgence  which  does  not  insert  its  sting  into  them  on  the  instant 
that  they  attempt  to  seize  it.  Here,  too,  however,  we  have  a 
counteracting  influence  in  the  vigilant  police,  which  can  be  easily 
provided  by  communities  assembled  in  cities.  Public  opinion  was 
the  police  in  the  rural  district;  and  when  the  public  became  too 
extended,  and  its  opinion  too  diffused,  to  be  effective  at  any  one 
point,  it  found  means,  in  its  very  extension,  of  arresting  the  evil 
which  its  extension  occasioned. 

The  same  kind  of  observation,  carried  out  to  other  states  of 
Hociety,  will  detect  similar  counterbalancing  agencies.  The  poor 
are  dependent  upon  one  another,  and  are  in  consequence  kind  and 
obliging.  It  is  seldom  that  a  sufferer  in  the  lower  grades  of  life 
is  neglected  by  neighbors  and  relatives.  A  dozen  sick-nurses  are 
ready  to  proffer  their  services  when  a  poor  man  is  in  severe  dis- 
tress, and  are  all  the  more  likely  to  perform  their  offices  in  a  kindly 
manner,  from  the  circumstance  that  they  look  for  no  fee  or  reward. 
The  richer  portion  of  the  community  do  not  feel  themselves  to  be 
so  dependent  on  their  neighbors  and  friends,  and  hence  are  not  so 
kind  in  their  offices ;  but  then  the  sufferer  does  not  require  the 
same  tokens  of  friendship  and  regard,  for  he  can  purchase  for 
money  what  the  other  obtains  from  affection.  The  same  remark 
applies  to  those  countries  which  differ  from  each  other  in  respect 
of  the  provision  made  by  law  for  the  support  of  the  poor.  When 
there  is  no  legal  provision  every  poor  man  is  disposed  to  sympa- 
thize with  his  neighbor,  from  a  keen  perception  of  his  own  possi- 


AIDS    TO    VIRTUE,    AND    RESTRAINTS    UPON    VICE.          249 

ble  condition.  On  the  introduction  of  poor-laws  these  gentle  offices 
are  apt  to  cease,  for  they  are  felt  to  be  no  longer  demanded  by  so 
strong  and  imperative  a  necessity. 

Again,  the  savage  feels  how  dependent  he  is  upon  his  family 
and  his  tribe,  and  lie  exhibits  corresponding  qualities.  He  becomes 
hospitable  and  clannish  in  his  character.  But  while  kind  to  in- 
dividuals, and  devoted  to  his  tribe,  he  has  no  universal  benevo- 
lence, and  reckons  himself  at  liberty  to  make  war  with  every 
tribe  not  specially  connected  with  his  own.  As  society  advance? 
in  civilization  each  man  becomes  less  dependent  on  immediate 
neighbors,  but  feels  more  and  more  his  connection  with  the  race ; 
and  hence  he  is  apt,  in  the  clashing  competition  of  the  world,  to 
become  individually  selfish,  but  generally  benevolent  and  cos- 
mopolitan. 

What  are  commonly  called  the  vis  medicatrix  of  nature,  and 
the  vis  conservatrix  of  society,  spring,  we  believe,  from  such  checks 
and  adjustments  as  these,  rather  than  from  any  inherent  power  in 
the  objects  themselves.  God  has  so  constituted  society  that  there 
is  a  means  of  counteracting  human  caprice,  whatever  be  the  form 
which  it  assumes.  Society,  like  the  steam-engine,  has  its  regula- 
tors and  safety-valves,  all  self-acting,  and  ready  to  act,  whatever 
be  the  quarter  from  which  the  danger  proceeds.  At  the  same 
time,  it  ever  happens  that  things  proceed  most  prosperously  when 
there  is  no  interference  with  them  on  the  part  of  meddling  wisdom, 
which  is  folly  differing  from  other  folly,  only  in  so  far  as  it  is  more 
conceited.  When  man  attempts  to  supply  the  physical  wants  of 
society,  by  a  method  of  his  own,  in  contempt  of  the  plan  of  Prov- 
idence— as  the  rulers  of  ancient  Rome  tried  on  more  than  one 
occasion,  and  as  has  been  proposed  at  times  in  more  than  one 
modern  nation,  he  immediately  feels  his  impotency.  Whately 
proposes  the  problem-  of  human  wisdom  seeking  to  supply  with 
provisions  of  all  kinds  such  a  society  as  our  metropolis.  "  Now, 
let  any  one  consider  the  problem  in  all  its  bearings,  reflecting  on 
the  enormous  and  fluctuating  number  of  persons  to  be  fed,  the 
immense  quantity  and  variety  of  provisions  to  be  furnished,  the 
importance  of  a  convenient  distribution  of  them,  and  the  necessity 
of  husbanding  them  discreetly ;  and  then  let  him  reflect  on  the 
anxious  toil  which  such  a  task  would  impose  on  a  board  of  the 
most  experienced  and  intelligent  commissioners,  who  after  all 
would  be  able  to  discharge  their  office  but  very  inadequately.  Yet 
this  object  is  accomplished  far  better  than  it  could  be  by  any  effort 


250          AIDS    TO    VIRTUE,    AND    RESTRAINTS    UPON    VICE. 

of  human  wisdom,  through  the  agency  of  men  who  think  each 
of  nothing  but  his  more  immediate  interest,  who,  with  that  object 
in  view,  perform  their  respective  parts  with  cheerful  zeal,  and 
combine  unconsciously  to  employ  the  wisest  means  for  effecting 
an  object,  the  vastness  of  which  would  bewilder  them  even  to  con- 
template." The  recognition  by  our  country  of  the  doctrine  of  free- 
trade  is  truly  an  acknowledgment  of  the  superiority  of  the  wisdom 
of  God  to  the  wisdom  of  the  most  far-sighted  intermeddling  states- 
man. It  is  truly  so,  whether  the  parties  who  support  the  doctrine 
perceive  it  or  no;  for  while,  as  Whately  remarks,  these  great 
social  ends  are  best  accomplished  by  the  unconscious  combination 
of  human  beings,  (here  is  most  assuredly  a  conscious  power  assort- 
ing this  combination  which  is  unconscious  in  itself.  It  is  implied 
in  the  doctrine  of  free  trade  that  the  Governor  of  the  world  hath 
arranged  everything  in  such  wisdom,  that  man  in  meddling  with 
it  helps  only  to  mar  it. 

Without  such  arrangements  as  these,  favoring  what  is  good  and 
discouraging  what  is  evil,  it  is  evident  that  virtue  would  have 
great  difficulty  in  retaining  a  place  in  our  world.  But  by  such 
powerful  instrumentality  God,  in  spite  of  human  wickedness,  can 
keep  this  world  from  lapsing  into  total  disorder.  This  agency  is 
so  powerful,  operates  so  universally,  can  so  change  with  changing 
circumstances,  can  be  wielded  so  suddenly  and  unexpectedly,  and 
with  such  awful  and  irresistible  force,  that  God  might,  we  doubt 
not,  rule  by  it  a  world  in  which  there  was  not  one  virtuous  princi- 
ple, or  truly  holy  affection. 

With  such  aids  to  virtue,  and  restraints  upon  vice,  we  see  how 
perilous  it  would  be  to  alter  the  present  constitution  of  things  in 
favor  of  what  seems  to  human  wisdom  to  be  a  better.  Defects 
might  easily  be  pointed  out  in  the  very  theories  of  the  communists, 
whether  they  assume  the  forms  of  St.  Simon,  Owen  or  Fourier. 
All  proceed  on  the  assumed  principle,  that  men  are  always  or  usu- 
ally swayed  by  an  enlarged  self-love,  according  to  which  every 
man  will  pursue  his  best  interests  when  he  knows  them  ;  and  on 
the  supposed  fact  that  the  associations  set  up  to  provide  for  the 
best  interests  of  the  members.  Now,  this  principle  we  might  show 
proceeds  on  a  mistaken  view  of  human1  character.  Mankind  are 
far  more  frequently  swayed  by  feelings,  sentiments,  impulses,  and 
passions,  by  kindness,  sympathy,  and  affection,  by  vanity,  pride, 
and  obstinacy,  by  ambition,  envy,  and  revenge,  than  even  by  a 
calculating  selfishness.  In  the  systems  of  the  communists  there 


STATE  OF  SOCIETY  WHEN  THE  AIDS  TO  VIRTUE,  ETC.       251 

is  and  can  be  no  provision  made  for  exercising,  guiding,  and  con- 
trolling such  a  conglomerate  of  sentiments  and  lusts.  Hence 
their  experimental  communities  have  invariably,  and  very  speedily, 
become  scenes  of  wretchedness  and  dissension.  But  there  is  such 
a  provision  made  in  the  constitution  of  the  world  as  under  the  dis- 
cipline of  God ;  and  all  attempts  to  interfere  with  any  particular 
part  of  it,  such  as  the  family  ordinance,  will  turn  out  to  be  as  fool- 
ish as  they  are  commonly  wicked  and  profane. 

All  endeavofs  to  elevate  the  degraded  and  the  fallen,  so  far  as 
they  are  not  immediately  religious,  should  proceed  on  the  principle 
of  calling  in  those  aids  and  restraints  which  Providence  furnishes. 
If  the  rising  members  of  our  agricultural  laborers,  for  instance, 
are  degraded  in  some  districts  of  our  land,  by  being  cast  out  from 
the  family,  the  cure  is  to  be  found  in  restoring  them  to  the  privi- 
lege of  the  family  ordinance.  It  will  be  found,  too,  that  every 
effectual  means  of  reclaiming  the  abandoned  and  the  outcast  must 
contain  within  it  a  method  of  bringing  the  parties  anew  under  the 
power  of  those  supports  which  Providence  affords  to  the  continu- 
ance in  virtue.  It  may  be  doubted,  whether  the  attempts  at 
present  made  to  elevate  the  abandoned  in  the  crowded  lanes  of 
our  large  towns  can  be  successful,  as  a  national  measure,  till  the 
very  crowding  of  human  beings  is  abandoned  as  a  system  contrary 
to  nature,  and  until  the  population  are  spread  out  in  communities 
in  which  the  aids  to  virtue  may  again  come  into  force.  The  evils, 
which  extended  manufactures  have  brought  along  with  them, 
must  be  remedied  by  the  wealth  which  these  manufactures  have 
furnished  being  taxed  to  bring  about  the  natural  system  which 
they  have  deranged.  In  order  to  secure  the  co-operation  of  Pro- 
vidence we  must  adopt  the  system  of  Providence,  and  place  the 
parties  under  its  influence.  Without  this,  all  mere  secular  means 
will  be  found  utterly  useless  in  elevating  human  character  to  a 
higher  level.  Human  wisdom  is  in  its  highest  exercise  when  it  is 
observing  the  superiority  of  Divine  wisdom,  and  following  its 
method  of  procedure. 


SECTION.  IV.— STATE  OF  SOCIETY  WHEN  THE  AIDS  TO  VIRTUE  AND 
THE  RESTRAINTS  UPON  VICE  ARE  WITHDRAWN. 

We  have  been  pointing  out  some  of  the  embankments  by  which 
the  turbulent  stream  of  human  life  is  kept  in  its  course,  some  of 
the  rocky  barriers  by  which  the  waves  of  this  ever-agitated  sea 


252      STATE  OF  SOCIETY  WHEN  THE  AIDS  TO  VIRTUE  AND 

are  restrained  while  they  lash  upon  them.  Just  as  the  native 
power  of  the  stream  is  seen  when  the  embankments  are  swept 
away,  and  the^  irresistible  strength  of  the  ocean  when  its  opposing 
barriers  are  broken  down,  so  there  are  times  and  places  in  which 
the  usual  supports  of  virtue  and  correctives  of  vice  are  removed, 
and  we  behold  the  true  tendency  of  inward  humanity.  The 
character  of  the  prisoner  is  discovered  when  the  keepers  are  ab- 
sent. There  are  certain  extremes  in  human  life  which  the  sup- 
ports cannot  so  easily  reach,  and  there  we  discern  the  development 
of  the  native  propensities  of  the  heart.  We  see  the  true  dispo- 
sitions of  the  children  at  those  corners  at  which  the  master's  eye 
is  not  upon  them. 

Let  us  examine  the  workings  of  human  nature,  when  those 
adventitious  circumstances  which  usually  prop  human  virtue  are 
removed.  Take  a  young  man  from  a  kind  and  religious  home, 
transplant  him  suddenly  into  a  foreign  land,  and  place  him  in  a 
state  of  society  in  which  high  moral  and  religious  character,  in- 
stead of  being  valued  and  honored,  is  rather  scoffed  at  and  de- 
spised, and  operates  as  a  barrier  in  the  way  of  success.  This 
youth,  if  allowed  to  remain  in  the  scenes  in  which  he  was  nur- 
tured, might  have  been  honorable  and  generous,  and  apparently 
pious  in  his  demeanor  ;  but  in  the  new  scenes  in  which  he  finds 
himself,  he  can  be  influenced  by  none  of  those  considerations  de- 
rived from  prudence  and  the  oversight  of  kind  friends,  which  be- 
fore guided  him — and  it  is  possible  that  after  a  brief  struggle,  he 
abandons  himself  to  selfishness,  rapacity,  and  licentiousness,  under 
every  available  form.  Why  this  difference?  Because,  in  the  one 
case,  virtuous  conduct  is  aided,  and  in  the  other  it  is  left  unbe- 
friended.  We  are  not  at  present  inquiring  into  the  actual  power 
which  virtue  possesses  in  the  human  heart ;  but  it  seems  certain 
that  there  are  thousands  who  court  virtue  when  she  has  a  dowry, 
who  would  discover  no  loveliness  in  her  if  she  had  no  attractions 
beyond  her  own  beauty. 

The  difficulty  which  the  philanthropist  experiences  in  dealing 
with  the  outcasts  of  society,  on  whom  the  aids  to  virtue  have  lost 
their  power,  furnishes  another  illustration  of  the  same  truth.  It 
is  not  because  they  are  so  much  worse  than  others  that  he  finds 
his  work  to  be  so  difficult,  but  because  motives  which  operate 
powerfully  upon  mankind  in  general,  such  as  pride,  vanity,  and  a 
sense  of  character,  have  no  influence  upon  them  for  good.  It  is 
now  generally  acknowledged  that,  in  order  to  the  reclaiming  of 


THE    RESTRAINTS    UPON    VICE    ARE    WITHDRAWN.         253 

criminals  whose  term  of  punishment  is  expired,  it  is  absolutely 
necessary  to  distribute  them  in  society,  and  in  localities  in  which 
their  previous  conduct  is  unknown,  and  all  that  they  may  come 
once  more  under  the  ordinary  motives  of  humanity.  Our  philan- 
thropists have  thus  been  brought  to  acknowledge  the  wisdom  of 
the  Divine  method,  and  find  that  their  success  depends  on  their 
accommodating  themselves  to  it.  Yet  how  dark  a  view  is  thereby 
given  of  human  character,  when  it  needs  such' a  carefully  con- 
structed system  of  props  to  bear  up  that  virtue  which  should  have 
stood  in  its  own  strength. 

The  rapidity  with  which  certain  persons  become  utterly  reck- 
less and  abandoned  when  detected  in  crime,  also  points  to  the 
same  conclusion.  How  quick,  for  instance,  the  descent  of  females, 
and  especially  of  ladies  in  the  upper  walks  of  society,  and  also  of 
clergymen,  when  they  have  fallen  into  intemperance  or  impurity, 
or  some  similar  vice,  and  been  detected  and  exposed.  Others 
might  fall  into  the  same  sins  and  rise  again  ;  but  the  persons  now 
referred  to  feel  as  if  a  stain  had  been  left  on  their  character  which 
human  lustrations  cannot  wash  out,  and  for  which  society  pro- 
vides no  expiation  ;  and  concluding  that  they  cannot  be  bettered, 
they  are  led  without  difficulty  tti  abandon  themselves  to  every  be- 
setting lust.  The  love  of  virtue,  for  virtue's  sake,  may  be  as 
powerful  in  this  class  as  in  the  others,  who  have  extricated  them- 
selves from  the  toils  which  at  one  time  surrounded  them ;  and 
wherein  then  lies  the  difference?  The  tendency  of  both  is  down- 
ward ;  but  as  the  one  class  is  rolling  on  it  is  caught,  and  at  last 
restrained  by  a  thousand  objects  which  Providence  puts  in  the 
way,  such  as  vanity,  sense  of  character,  and  worldly  success ; 
whereas,  in  regard  to  the  other,  such  barriers  being  removed, 
their  course  becomes  that  of  the  stone  loosened  from  the  brow 
of  the  mountain,  and  descending  with  an  ever  accelerated  speed. 

It  seems  as  if  virtuous  and  religious  principle  are  so  weak,  that 
the  man  of  highest  character  might,  if  placed  in  other  circum- 
stances, have  become  the  most  vicious.  No  one  can  tell  how  much 
he  owes  of  the  character  which  he  may  have  been  able  to  sus- 
tain to  the  restraints  of  Providence  rather  than  to  any  high  and 
holy  internal  principle. 

Take  either  of  the  extremes  of  earthly  rank,  and  you  find  hu- 
man  nature  showing  its  native  inclination.  It  is  proverbial  that 
the  extremes  of  wickedness  collect  at  the  extremes  of  society. 
Place  persons  so  high  that  they  feel  that  they  cannot  mount 


254      STATE    OP    SOCIETY    WHEN   THE    AIDS    TO    VIRTUE    AND 

higher,  for  they  are  on  their  very  pinnacle,  and  so  protect  them 
that  they  feel  that  they  are  secured  by  their  very  position  from 
falling,  and  the  true  disposition  of  man's  heart  will  now  be  ex- 
hibited. Weakness  and  follies,  which  those  who  climb  by  the 
help  of  other  men  the  heights  of  worldly  aggrandizement  would 
carefully  curb  or  conceal,  are  unblushingly  displayed,  or  perhaps 
even  gloried  in,  by  those  who  feel  their  independence ;  and  vices 
which  might  have  been  kept  down  under  a  salutary  fear  of  failure 
are  allowed  to  spring  up  in  rank  luxuriance.  Or  take  the  other 
extreme.  Place  a  man  so  low  that  he  cannot  fall,  and  chain  him 
so  down  that  he  cannot  rise,  and  again  his  inborn  character  de- 
velops itself.  The  virtues  which  proceed  from  a  sense  of  shame 
and  a  fear  of  offence,  now  disappear,  as  well  as  all  those  which 
spring  up  from  a  desire  to  rise  in  society.  Discontent  and  grumb- 
ling, envy  and  malignity  leading  to  dishonesty  and  reckless  crimi- 
nality become  the  characteristics  of  this  state  of  society,  just  as 
luxury,  licentiousness,  indolence,  and  a  selfish  indifference  to  all 
human  interests,  are  the  distinguishing  features  of  those  who  are 
in  the  enjoyment  of  prosperity  which  cannot  be  broken.  In  the 
one  state,  society,  with  its  sunk  and  dangerous  classes,  spreads 
crime  like  a  malaria,  and  is  ready  for  revolution  ;  while  in  the 
other,  it  abandons  itself  to  the  softest  and  yet  most  selfish  effemi- 
nacy, running  after  every  frivolity,  and  ready  to  contend  for 
nothing  but  its  own  pleasures,  and  to  labor  for  nothing  but  the 
retention  of  its  ease.  Our  earth  in  the  one  state  becomes  bare 
and  barren,  and  yet' wild,  rugged,  and  horrific,  with  dashing  cata- 
racts, and  dizzy  and  headlong  precipices ;  and  in  the  other  state, 
like  the  dead  swamps  of  moist  tropical  climates,  polluting  the  very 
atmosphere,  and  spreading  disease  and  death  by  the  excess  of  its 
putrid  and  putrifying  luxuriance. 

The  times  when  these  adventitious  props  which  keep  up  so- 
ciety are  removed,  have  generally  been  times  of  excessive  crimi- 
nality. Take  the  seasons  when  a  nation  is  intoxicated  and  mad- 
dened by  prosperity — take  Athens  when  its  free  citizens  had 
succeeded  in  some  of  their  schemes — or  Rome  when  the  victorious 
general  distributed  the  spoils  of  his  conquest — or  our  own  country 
at  the  rejoicing  on  account  of  the  restoration  of  Charles  II.,  being 
the  commencement  of  those  scenes  which  produced  so  deleterious 
an  influence  on  the  British  character  in  the  reign  of  that  monarch. 
What  excess  and  riot  in  the  festivals  at  these  times  ;  and  what  an 
abandonment  to  folly  which  does  not  even  deign  to  wear  a  mask, 


THE    RESTRAINTS    UPON    VICE    ARE    WITHDRAWN.         255 

or  offer  the  homage  which  vice  usually  pays  to  virtue  by  acting 
the  hypocrite.  The  pride  and  intemperance  which  prevail  in 
our  own  land,  when  wages  are  high  and  trade  is  flourishing, 
furnish  illustrations  of  the  same  tendency  in  our  nature. 

Both  poles,  the  negative  as  well  as  the  positive,  are  surcharged 
with  deleterious  influences  and  fatal  power.  A  nation  in  extreme 
poverty,  abandoned  by  the  stream  of  wealth  which  at  one  time 
fertilized  it,  devastated  by  the  inroads  of  war  or  consumed  by  in- 
testine broils,  wasted  by  famine  or  prostrated  by  pestilence,  has 
commonly  been  virulent  in  its  wickedness.  Society  at  these  times 
acts  like  the  seamen,  who,  when  the  last  hopes  of  saving  their 
vessel  or  themselves  in  the  storm  have  vanished,  betake  them- 
selves to  a  maddening  intoxication,  and  drink  of  any  exciting  or 
oblivious  draught  that  may  banish  reflection.  The  social  affec- 
tions are  dried  up  for  lack  of  that  delicate  tenderness  which  feeds 
them,  and  the  selfish  and  malignant  ones  spring  up  on  the  wrecks 
of  human  prosperity,  affording  them  suitable  nourishment.  On 
those  dreadful  coasts  on  which  wrecks  are  for  ever  strewn,  the  in- 
habitants are  tempted  to  light  up  fires  to  allure  the  vessels  with 
their  spoils  to  points  at  which  they  may  be  stranded,  and  their 
goods  seized.  It  is  a  picture,  on  a  small  scale,  of  those  states  of 
society  in  which  men  oppressed  with  want  feel  that  they  cannot 
better  themselves  by  sacrifices  to  virtue,  and  may  easily  improve 
their  condition  by  crime. 

There  have  been  times  of  upheaval  in  the  moral  world,  similar 
to  those  periods  which  geologists  describe  when  the  boiling  igne- 
ous fluid  from  below  has  uplifted  and  upturned  whole  continents 
and  ocean  beds  which  had  lain  undisturbed  for  ages.  The  dis- 
tinctions of  rank,  and  between  one  man's  property  and  another's, 
have  disappeared,  and  in  the  confusion  common  minds  feel  a  dif- 
ficulty in  keeping  hold  of  the  distinction  between  justice  and  in- 
justice— so  much  are  their  outward  marks  reversed  and  ^>n- 
founded.  The  king  is  bleeding  upon  the  scaffold,  and  nobles  are 
depending  on  their  own  peasantry,  and  judges  are  prisoners  at  the 
tribunals  over  which  they  presided,  and  the  priesthood  so  far  from 
having  power  with  heaven  are  seen  to  be  utterly  helpless,  and 
cunning  is  over-reaching  sincerity,  and  might  is  trampling  upon 
right,  and  unblushing  confidence  is  the  surest  means  of  success, 
and  bold  but  mean  men  are  everywhere  grasping  the  honor  and 
authority.  What  would  be  prudence  in  ordinary  circumstances 
is  now  the  highest  imprudence,  and  wisdom  with  all  its  gravity 


256       STATE    OF    SOCIETY    WHEN    THE    AIDS    TO    VIRTUE    AND 

is  visibly  inferior  to  folly.  At.  such  times  vice  will  come  forth 
without  deigning  to  wear  the  garb  of  virtue ;  and  it  stalks  abroad 
with  its  unblushing  face  unveiled,  and  'its  haggard  arms  laid  bare, 
to  find  out  and  seize  upon  its  victims ;  and  it  immolates  them 
with  the  one  hand,  while  it  lays  hold  of  the  spoil  with  the  other. 

The  thefts,  the  incendiarism,  the  rapes,  the  murders  which 
abound  at  the  sacking  of  a  town,  have  often  been  recorded  by 
historians.  The  atrocities  and  horrors  displayed  by  the  crowded 
inhabitants  of  Jerusalem  at  the  time  of  the  siege  by  Titus — the 
madness,  the  murders,  private  and  judicial,  and  the  unbridled 
licentiousness  of  the  period  of  upheaval  at  the  French  Revolution 
(prostitutes  graced  all  their  triumphs,  and  theatres  were  open  every 
night  during  the  reign  of  terror)  have  long  been  the  themes  of  in- 
dignant moralists.*  More  horrific  still  are  the  scenes  disclosed 
when  the  plague  visits  a  populous  city.  Thucydides  tells  us,  that 
when  the  plague  raged  at  Athens,  lawlessness  reigned  to  a  greater 
extent  than  ever  it  had  done  before.  When  the  people  saw  the 
sudden  changes  of  fortune,  both  in  regard  to  those  who  perished  so 
lamentably  in  the  midst  of  their  prosperity,  and  those  who  before  had 
nothing,  and  now.  came  to  inherit  large  possessions,  their  ideas 
became  confounded  and  their  principles  unsettled,  they  lost  all 
sense  of  honor,  and  openly  committed  deeds  which  men  are  wont 
to  hide  from  the  view.  Regarding  their  properties  and  lives  as  so 
precariously  situated,  they  abandoned  themselves  to  whatever  they 
thought  would  afford  them  immediate  enjoyment.  There  was  no 
fear  of  the  gods,  the  historian  tells  us,  for  they  felt  that  they  could 
not  be  bettered  by  the  worship  which  they  paid ;  nor  was  the  law 
of  man  regarded,  for  they  saw  that  human  law  could  not  inflict  a 
greater  evil  than  that  to  which  they  were  now  exposed.!  During 
the  plague  at  Milan  in  1630,  the  most  atrocious  deeds  were  per- 
petrated. Persons  named  monatti  were  authorized  to  enter  any 
ho%se  and  inspect  it — and  were  employed  to  carry  the  sick  to  the 
Lazaretto,  and  the  dead  to  the  sepulchre  ;  and  these  men  becom- 
ing hardened  in  heart  and  blunted  in  feeling  by  their  horrible 

*  "  Paris,"  says  Madam  Roland,  "  sees  its  brutalized  population  either  running  after 
ridiculous  fetes,  or  surfeiting  themselves  with  the  blood  of  crowds  of  unhappy  crea- 
tures sacrificed  to  its  ferocious  jealousy,  while  selfish  idlers  still  fill  all  the  theatres, 
and  the  trembling  tradesman  shuts  himself  up  in  his  own  house  not  sure  of  ever  again 
sleeping  in  his  own  bed,  if  it  should  please  any  of  his  neighbors  to  denounce  him  as 
having  used  unpatriotic  expressions."  All  through  the  Reign  of  Terror  there  were 
thirteen  or  fourteen  theatres  advertised  daily  in  the  newspapers. 

f  B.  ii.  63. 


THE    RESTRAINTS    UPON    VICE    ARE    WITHDRAWN.          257 

office,  came  forth  from  the  Lazaretto  with  feathers  in  their  caps 
and  singing  merry  songs,  threw  the  dead  into  the  carts  as  if  they 
had  been  a  sack  of  grain,  and  entered  the  houses  of  the  infected 
for  the  purposes  of  extortion  and  plunder.  Many  persons,  perceiving 
that  the  trade  was  lucrative,  assumed  the  dress  of  these  officials, 
and  were  guilty  of  robbery  and  the  most  shameful  excesses.  In 
the  Plague  in  London  in  1665,  there  were  numbers  running  with 
avidity  to  astrologers  and  fortune-tellers,  who  plied  their  work  with 
more  than  their  usual  effrontery  and  success  ;  others  who  made  a 
boast  of  their  profanity,  and  sported  their  blasphemy ;  there  were 
reports  of  nurses  and  watchmen  hastening  the  dissolution  of  the 
diseased  and  dying,  in  order  to  get  possession  of  their  property  ; 
and  there  was  more  than  the  common  number  of  thieves  and 
robbers,  and  these  busy  at  their  unhallowed  work  in  the  chamber* 
and  about  the  very  persons  of  the  dead  and  dying.  In  a  desolat- 
ing plague  at  Bagdad  in  1831,  there  was  the  usual  robbery  and 
pillage  ;  and  it  is  stated  that,  when  towards  its  close,  the  river  in 
undated  and  swept  away  15,000  people,  the  sensibilities  of  the  sur 
vivors  were  so  deadened  that  the  event  passed  without  any  remark 
being  made,  and  without  an  attempt  to  relieve  the  sufferers. 

It  looks  as  if  with  but  a  little  more  prosperity  distributed  among 
mankind  on  the  one  hand,  or  a  little  more  adversity  on  the  other, 
it  would  have  been  all  but  impossible,  by  the  ordinary  means  fit  to 
be  addressed  to  moral  and  responsible  beings,  to  keep  this  world  in 
subordination.  The  appalling  wickedness  which  prevailed  at 
Koine,  in  the  reigns  of  the  emperors  that  succeeded  Julius  Caesar, 
and  the  abandoned  shamelessness  of  the  males  and  females  of  the 
upper  classes,  seem  to  show  that  if  mankind  generally  were  placed 
in  a  situation  in  which  every  lust  could  be  indulged  without  re 
straint,  they  would  soon  give  themselves  up  to  crime  the  most 
offensive  and  intolerable.  "  The  corrupt  arid  opulent  nobles,"  says 
Gibbon,  "  gratified  every  vice  that  could  be  collected  from  the 
mighty  conflux  of  nations  and  manners.  Secure  of  impunity, 
careless  of  censure,  they  lived  without  restraint  in  the  patient  and 
humble  society  of  their  slaves  and  parasites.  The  emperor,  in  his 
turn,  viewing  every  rank  of  his  subjects  with  the  same  contemp- 
tuous indifference,  asserted  without  control  his  sovereign  pleasure 
of  lust  and  luxury."*  On  the  other  hand,  the  history  of  individ- 
uals, cities,  and  nations  in  the  time  of  famines  and  plagues,  indi- 
cates that,  with  more  intense  suffering,  the  race  would  have  been 
*  Decline  and  Fall,  B.  vi. 

17 


258      STATE    OP    SOCIETY    WHEN    THE    AIDS    TO    VIRTUE    AND 

as  if  drunken  with  wormwood.  With  a  sky  but  a  little  more 
bright  and  fiery,  or  a  little  more  clouded,  the  plants  of  the  earth 
would  wither;  with  an  atmosphere  which  had  a  little  more  or  a 
little  less  of  the  vital  element,  the  living  creatures  would  perish  ;  and 
it  would  seem  as  if,  with  a  little  more  or  a  little  less  suffering  in  the 
world,  man  would  lead  an  existence  now  troubled  and  now  pros- 
trated in  the  alternate  violence  and  exhaustion  of  a  constant  fever. 

Such  facts  seem  to  indicate  what  would  have  been  the  state  of 
the  world,  if  mankind,  as  a  whole,  had  been  placed  nearer  the  one 
extreme  or  the  other.  In  the  actual  world,  there  is  a  check  upon 
both  these  extremes  ;  but  a  check  which  would  not  have  been 
effectual,  if  they  had  not  been  extremes.  There  are  means,  in 
the  circumambient  conductors,  of  allowing  an  escape  to  the  dan- 
gerous power  which  might  collect  at  either  pole.  The  indolence 
and  luxuriousness  of  the  prosperous  classes,  as  seen,  for  instance, 
in  the  courts  of  Eastern  kings,  has  no  vitality  in  it,  and  it  putrifies 
like  the  vegetation  of  warmer  climates.  Again,  the  sterner  evils 
which  proceed  from  poverty  and  discontent  and  suffering,  clash 
and  fight  till  they  destroy  each  other  and  disappear.  The  ex- 
tremes thus  contain  their  own  checks  within  themselves ;  both 
are  suicidal ;  while  the  mean  is  kept  in  a  healthy  state  by  the  skil- 
ful counteractions  of  God's  natural  providence. 

The  conclusion  is  now  forcing  itself  upon  us,  that  virtue  so 
called  may  be  upheld  fully  as  much  by  the  providence  of  God  as 
by  the  strength  of  any  inherent  principle  within ;  and  that  this 
world  is  kept  from  inextricable  confusion  by  a  thousand  minute 
arrangements— as  the  ocean  is  held  in  its  bed  by  a  boundary  of 
particles  of  sand. 

And  what  must  be  the  character  and  condition  of  our  race 
when  these  restraints  are  withdrawn,  as  they  must  be  in  the  other 
world.  Some  sensitive  minds  shrink  from  the  very  idea  of  a  place 
of  darkness  to  which  the  wicked  are  consigned.  But  when  the 
wicked  are  separated  from  the  good,  and  when  the  wicked  are  not 
under  restraint,  we  cannot  conceive  how  there  should  be  anything 
else  than  hopeless  madness  and  violence.  Men  need  only  to  be 
abandoned  by  God  to  create  before  the  time  a  hell  on  this  earth. 

There  may  be  a  time  coming  in  our  world's  history  when  these 
restraints  being  removed,  human  wickedness  shall  reign  without 
control ;  when  the  convulsions  hitherto  confined  to  particular  spots 
shall  become  extensive  as  the  world ;  and  when  such  scenes  as 
those  presented  in  the  fall  of  Jerusalem,  at  the  close  of  the  Jewish 


ADAPTATION    OF   THIS    WORLD   TO    MAN,    ETC.  250 

Dispensation,  shall  be  acted  on  a  larger  theatre,  with  all  men  as 
actors,  and  the  universe  as  spectators.  It  has  often  been  remark- 
ed, that  revolutions  accomplish  in  the  moral  world  what  thunder- 
storms do  in  the  natural  world;  and  it  has  been  observed  by 
Niebuhr,  that  plagues,  such  as  that  at  Athens  in  the  time  of 
Pericles,  and  at  Rome  in  the  age  of  M.  Aurelius,  are  the  termina- 
tion of  one  course  of  things  and  the  commencement  of  another ; 
and  it  is  conceivable  that  this  present  dispensation  of  things  may 
terminate  in  a  convulsion,  which  is  to  be  the  forerunner  of  that 
«ra  of  peace  which  is  to  close  our  world's  history.  The  pillars  on 
which  this  present  imperfect  dispensation  is  supported  may  be 
pulled  down,  to  bury  in  the  ruins  all  that  is  evil,  and  as  the  pre- 
cursor of  a  period  of  peace  and  glorious  liberty. 


SECTION  V.— ADAPTATION  OF  THIS  WORLD  TO  MAN,  CONSIDERED- 
AS  A  FALLEN  BEING. 

WE  now  return  to  a  subject  which  came  frequently  before  us  in 
the  first  book.  Let  us  inquire  what  light  the  arrangements  of 
heaven,  which  we  have  been  considering,  throw  upon  the  character 
•of  man,  or  rather  upon  the  view  which  God  seems  to  take  of  the 
character  of  man.  We  are  aware  that  the  argument  cannot  be 
conclusive,  till  we  take  a  separate  survey  of  human  nature  on  in- 
dependent evidence.  But  still  it  may  be  confirmatory  of  the  infer- 
ences to  be  drawn  in  the  subsequent,  book  to  find  all  other  roads 
leading  to  the  same  point,  all  the  lines  converging  to  one  centre. 
It  is  not  needful  to  repeat  what  was  said  in  the  first  book  as  to  the 
various  indications  given  in  God's  works  of  a  holy  God,  a  moral 
governor,  and  a  fallen  world.  We  feel  now,  however,  as  if,  after  the 
survey  taken,  we  were  able  to  bring  new  considerations,  and  old 
considerations  with  new  force,  to  support  the  doctrine  which  then 
recommended  itself  on  the  ground  of  general  probability. 

Looking  at  the  arrangements  which  God  hath  made  in  the 
physical  world,  we  find  them  to  be  actually  employed  in  guiding 
and  restraining  mankind.  Looking  at  their  structure  and  organi- 
zation, we  find  them  fitted  to  accomplish  these  ends.  We  are  en- 
titled then  to  conclude  that  they  are  intended  to  effect  these  pur- 
poses. We  say  intended,  for  while  man  may  perform  acts  fitted 
to  produce  a  given  end  without  knowing  it,  there  is  room  for  no 
such  distinction  in  reference  to  the  doings  of  the  omniscient  and 
•omnipresent  God.  We  are  convinced  that  those  skilful  arrange 


260 


ADAPTATION    OF    THIS    WORLD    TO    MAN, 


ments,  general  tmd  particular,  by  which  God  trains  mankind  to 
outward  decency  of  deportment,  and  restrains  them  from  evil,  are 
all  contemplated  and  designed  by  God.  But  would  such  a  system 
of  aids  and  checks  have  been  required  in  an  unfallen  world? 
Would  it  have  been  permitted  in  a  world  in  which  all  was  pure 
and  holy? 

Let  us  recall  the  process  by  which  it  is  demonstrated  that  a  God 
exists.  It  is  by  a  brief  argument,  founded  on  the  design  which 
everywhere  meets  our  eye.  But  as  we  survey  the  phenomena 
that  indicate  design,  we  find  them  not  only  indicating  design  in 
general,  but  design  to  a  given  end  in  reference  to  mankind.  Some 
of  them  have  palpably  a  benevolent  end,  as  the  beautiful  revolu- 
tion of  the  seasons,  providing  sustenance  for  God's  creatures. 
Others  just  as  palpably  have  it  in  view  to  keep  men  externally 
virtuous,  when  virtuous  principle  might  fail,  to  restrain  evil  when 
the  hatred  of  sin  might  exercise  little  or  no  influence,  and  to  arrest 
the  consequences  which  might  follow  from  human  folly.  Prove  to 
us  that  God's  providence  is  so  ordered  as  to  institute  a  special  pro- 
vision for  the  wants  of  God's  creatures,  and  we  shall  prove  by  u 
similar,  and  as  large  an  induction  of  facts,  that  it  has  also  respect 
to  the  limiting  and  correcting  of  human  vice  and  folly. 

The  argument  may  be  otherwise  stated.  Lord  Brougham,  m 
his  Natural  Theology,  while  proving  that  there  is  benevolent  de- 
sign in  the  works  of  God,  argues  in  the  following  way  : — "  Had 
I  to  accomplish  this  purpose,  I  would  have  used  some  such  means  ; 
or,  Had  I  used  these  means,  I  should  have  thought  I  was  accom- 
plishing some  such  purpose.  Perceiving  the  adaptation  of  the 
means  to  the  end,  the  inference  is,  that  some  being  has  acted  as 
we  should  ourselves  act,  and  with  the  same  views."*  Suppose, 
for  instance,  that  it  was  our  design  to  give  an  easy  and  pleasant 
motion  to  a  certain  member  of  the  body,  could  we  have  used  a 
more  suitable  instrumentality  than  that  actually  employed,  in  the 
joints  with  the  attached  muscles  of  the  human  frame  ?  Let  us 
carry  out  this  mode  of  reasoning,  and  apply  it  to  the  providence 
of  God,  as  the  author  now  quoted  does,  to  the  structure  of  partic- 
ular parts  of  nature.  Suppose  that,  it  had  been  our  design  to  pro- 
duce right  conduct  in  persons  in  whom  right  principle  was  weak 
or  wanting,  to  arrest  and  control  human  action  when  it  tended  to 
evil,  and  to  stop  man  in  his  career  of  wickedness,  could  we  have 
employed  a  readier  or  a  more  effectual  means  ?  It  does  look  as 
'  *  Nat.  Theo.  P.  i.  §  8. 


CONSIDERED  AS  A  FALLEN  BEING.  261 

if  God  had  constructed  his  providence  with  a  special  view  to  a 
race  considered  by  him  as  prone  to  evil,  and  to  be  kept  from  it  by 
external  restraint,  fully  as  much  as  by  internal  principle.  It 
would  appear  as  if  God  employed  such  an  instrumentality,  that 
he  might  be  governor  of  the  world  in  spite  of  human  rebellion. 

Let  us  examine  some  of  the  arrangements  of  Providence,  which 
seem  specially  to  have  this  end  in  view.  There  is  the  constitution 
of  things,  according  to  which  man  has  a  motive  to  labor,  and  is 
constrained  to  labor.  The  motive  to  labor  and  industry  is  fur- 
nished by  the  scheme  of  general  laws ;  observing  and  acting  on 
which,  he  can  secure  the  object  which  he  needs  or  desires.  But 
there  is  not  only  an  encouragement  to  labor,  there  is  a  compulsion 
to  toil,  and  severe  toil,  arising  from  the  necessity  of  procuring  sus- 
tenance to  our  bodily  frames,  and  from  the  grudging  manner  in 
which  our  earth  yields  its  fruits,  never,  supplying  more,  after  all 
the  pains  bestowed  upon  it,  than  can  supply  the  wants  of  man- 
kind. Why,  we  ask,  this  necessity  for  toil?  Look  at  the  laborer 
doggedly  exerting  himself,  from  early  dawn,  till  night,  in  turning 
over  the  surface  of  the  ground,  that  he  may  allure  it  to  give  him 
the  support  which  it  will  not  yield  unless  coaxed  and  dealt  with? 
Or  view  this  other  individual  levelling  and  embanking  the  earth, 
and  digging  deep  mines,  and  all  that  he  may  secure  some  object 
which  he  cannot  obtain  without  a  large  payment  in  the  sweat  oi 
his  body.  Enter  one  of  our  great  factories,  or  the  workshop  of  the 
engineer,  and  it  does  look  as  if  the  heathens  conveyed  a  truth  in 
mythic  fable,  when  they  represented  Vulcan  as  expelled  from 
heaven,  and  his  servants,  the  Cyclopeans,  consigned  to  their  forge 
vas  a  punishment?  Whence  the  necessity  for  this  excessive  toil? 
Why  did  not  God  so  construct  this  earth  as  that  it  would  cheer- 
fully yield  its  produce,  without  any  labor  but  such  as  would  be 
felt  to  be  a  recreation  ?  Could  he  not  have  fashioned  the  world  at 
first  with  an  apparatus  fitted  to  save  man  from  drudgery,  and  to 
enable  him  to  exert  his  faculties  of  body  and  mind,  without  feeling 
the  exercise  to  be  grievous  ?  Or  could  he  not  have  given  us  other 
senses  besides  these  five,  to  make  us  in  some  measure  independent 
of  the  means  which  we  are  constrained  by  our  position  to  employ, 
and  which  we  feel  to  be  so  laborious  ?  Or  why,  if  mankind  had 
to  labor,  was  not  that  labor  freed  from  all  feeling  of  burden  and 
fatigue  ? 

Then  there  is  not  only  the  toil,  there  is  also  the  pain  to  which 
man  is  subjected,  as  the  necessary  result  of  die  arrangementSy 


262         ADAPTATION  OF  THIS  WORLD  TO  MAN, 

general  and  particular,  of  Providence.  We  cannot  call  human* 
sorrows  accidental,  for  they  follow  directly  from  the  appointment 
of  God.  We  cannot  describe  them  as  casual,  for  all  are  liable  to- 
them.  Human  prudence  cannot  avoid  them,  nor  human  strength 
avert  them.  They  proceed  directly  from  causes  which  God  him- 
self hath  instituted.  They  are  as  immediately  the  result  of  the 
Divine  appointment,  as  the  very  blessings  which  flow  to  mankind 
in  such  happy  abundance. 

Man  has  been  subjected  to  such  incessant  toiB  and  misery  in  all 
ages  of  the  world,  and  in  all  states  of  society.  Take  even  the 
nations  which  have  been  most  celebrated,  and  which  have  reached 
the  highest  pitch  of  civilization.  The  'greater  achievements  of 
man.  his  stupendous  buildings,  and  his  conquests,  are  apt  so  to 
dazzle  the  eyes  that  we  cannot  take  a  very  narrow  or  correct  in- 
spection of  them.  As  we  feel  that  thirty  centuries  look  down  from 
the  pyramids  of  Egypt,  we  are  loath  to  make  inquiry  into  the 
exact  degradation  of  those  millions  of  unhappy  slaves  and  cap- 
tives who  toiled  at  the  work.  We  willingly  forget  that  the  great 
mass  of  the  people,  consigned  to  perpetual  drudgery,  were  mere 
tools  in  the  hands  of  one  man  of  exorbitant  power,  and  that  he 
may  have  been  harassed  by  anxieties,  fears,  and  suspicions,  as- 
much  as  those  under  him  were  oppressed  by  bodily  toil. 

In  our  admiration  of  the  brilliant  intellectual  qualities  of  ancient 
Greece,  we  are  not  apt  to  remember  that  in  Attica,  while  there 
were  120,000  citizens,  there  were  400,000  slaves ;  that  in  Sparta 
there  were  150,000  citizens  and  500,000  slaves.  In  Italy,  so  early 
as  the  time  of  the  Gracchi  there  were  hardly  to  be  found  any  free 
husbandmen ;  and  in  the  city  of  Rome,  nearly  all  manual  labor 
was  performed  by  slaves  or  freedmen.  Single  masters  in  the- 
Roman  State  are  reported  to  have  had  so  many  as  10,000  or  20,000> 
slaves.  Gibbon  reckons  that,  about  the  time  of  the  Christian  erar 
there  might  be  a  slave  for  every  freeman  throughout  the  provinces, 
of  the  empire.  Blair  calculates  that,  at  the  same  period  in  Italy,, 
there  might  be  three  times  as  many  slaves  as  freemen.  We  need! 
not  draw  any  picture  of  the  evils,  physical,  intellectual  and  moral,, 
fo  which  the  people  would  be  exposed  in  such  a  state  of  society  r 
ris  the  mind  of  modern  Europe  is  happily  sensitive  on  the  subject 
of  slavery. 

Contrasting  ourselves  with  the  ancients,  we  boast,  and  we  are 
so  far  entitled  to  boast,  of  modern  civilization.  "  In  a  civilized 
and  free  country  the  energies,  or  wealth,  or  command  of  labor  is 


CONSIDERED  AS  A  FALLEN  BEING.  263; 

employed  by  individuals  for  their  own  convenience,  comfort,  or 
luxury  ;  in  former  clays,  when  the  command  of  the  labor  depended 
on  one  man,  then  the  population  was  forced  to  apply  their  means 
and  energies  to  gratify  his  wishes,  not  to  their  individual  advan- 
tage. Even  in  the  middle  ages  this  seems  to  have  been  the  case."* 
The  distinction  referred  to  exists,  but  it  does  not  amount  to  so 
much  as  the  author  now  quoted  would  have  us  to  believe.  In 
ancient  times  the  laboring  classes  were  supplied  by  those  who  em- 
ployed them,  with  at  least  the  necessaries  of  life ;  and  there  were 
architects,  master-builders,  and  overseers  of  works,  there  were  cen- 
turions and  other  army  officials,  all  with  large  privileges,  besides 
proprietors  and  occupants  .of  the  soil,  together  composing  an  im- 
portant middle  class.  And  is  it  not  still  true  that  the  great  body 
of  the  people  are  toiling  for  the  benefit  of  landlords  or  capitalists  ? 
It  may  be  doubted  whether  the  working  classes,  in  our  own  land 
and  age,  have  not  as  great  an  amount  of  toil,  and  as  few  bodily 
comforts  (we  speak  not  now  of  higher  privileges,  in  respect  of 
which  the  modern  is  immeasurably  superior,)  to  remunerate  them, 
as  the  slaves  in  ancient  Egypt  or  Rome.  We  are  apt  to  be  de- 
luded when  we  take  a  survey  of  our  own  achievements,  as  much 
as  when  we  examine  those  of  the  ancients.  Our  nearness  to  them 
impresses  us  unduly  with  their  greatness.  Ever  since  the  day.s 
of  Dr.  Adam  Smith,  we  have  been  seeking  to  promote  a  great  ab- 
straction which  we  call  national  wealth,  and  in  looking  to  it  we 
forget  that  to  which  it  should  be  a  mere  stepping  stone — national 
happiness  and  national  virtue.  A  traveller  takes  a  rapid  tour 
through  the  manufacturing  districts  of  England,  and  visits  the 
more  important  cities ;  and  he  is  filled  with  admiration  of  our 
large  factories,  and  mighty  machinery,  and  shipping  advertised  to 
sail  to  every  continent  and  island  and  important  city  in  the  world. 
But  has  he  entered  the  houses  in  which  the  workmen  live? — has 
he  sitten  at  their  boards  and  viewed  their  domestic  arrangements? 
— has  he  inquired  into  the  character  of  woman  as  affected  by  the 
state  of  society  or  her  work,  which  takes  her  from  her  family,  or 
renders  her  unfit  for  the  management  of  it? — has  he  inquired  into 
the  training  of  the  rising  generation,  and  estimated  the  tempta- 
tions of  the  youth  of  both  sexes  at  that  critical  period  of  their  life 
when  the  feelings  of  pride  arid  independence  spring  up  simultane- 
ously with  the  rise  of  the  lustful  passions  ?— has  he  done  as  the 
poet  Crabbe  did  when,  after  Sir  Walter  Scott  had  shown  him  the 
*  Mackinnou  on  Civilization. 


264  ADAPTATION    OP    THIS    WORLD    TO    MAN. 

beauties  of  nature  and  art  for  which  the  metropolis  of  Scotland  is 
so  distinguished,  he  was  not  satisfied  till  he  visited  those  humble 
and  humbling  abodes  to  which  the  poor  and  outcast  had  been 
driven  by  crime  or  misfortune? — has  he  visited  those  crowded 
lanes  of  our  cities,  whose  physical  is  not  so  polluted  as  their  moral 
atmosphere,  but  in  which  the  heart — larger  than  even  the  imagi- 
nation— of  Dr.  Chalmers,  used  to  feel  a  livelier  interest  than  in 
the  gorgeous  scenes  of  nature  which  he  so  much  admired?  If 
he  has  dene  this,  he  will  be  ready  to  doubt  whether  any  country, 
in  any  age,  has  produced  a  more  demoralized  and  debauched  pop- 
ulation than  the  masses  to  be  found  in  some  of  our  large  cities, 
(and  not  a  few  of  our  agricultural  laborers  are  no  better,)  posses- 
sing as  they  do  little  of  civilization  but  its  vices,  and  the  know- 
ledge and  wealth  of  the  classes  above  them  producing  in  them 
only  discontent  and  jealousy. 

The  imagination  is  apt  to  be  still  more  excited  by  the  stirring 
incidents  of  war.  When  we  read  in  their  own  language,  whose 
march  is  as  magnificent  as  that  of  their  armies,  of  the  conquests 
of  the  Romans,  we  forget  at  what  an  expense  of  human  suffering 
these  victories  were  gained.  We  do  not,  for  instance,  trouble  our- 
selves to  conceive  of  the  misery  which  must  have  resulted  from 
Paulus  Emilius  bringing  150,000  captives  from  his  wars  in  Epi- 
rus,  and  selling  them  as  prize-money  for  his  soldiers  ;  or  from  Ju- 
lius Caesar  taking  captive  half  a  million  of  human  beings  in  his 
Gallic  wars  and  selling  them  into  slavery.  In  thinking  of  the  age 
of  Augustus,  there  are  few  persons  who  give  any  prominence  to 
the  circumstance  recorded  by  an  historian,  that  fathers  were  in 
the  way  of  mutilating  the  bodies  of  their  sons  that  they  might  not 
be  liable  to  serve  in  the  Roman  armies,  which  were  the  terror  of 
half  the  world.  We  reflect  little  on  the  means,  terrible  as  the 
very  wars  themselves,  which  were  required  to  keep  up  the  war- 
like spirit,  as  when,  in  one  of  the  exhibitions  of  Trajan,  no  fewer 
than  10,000  gladiators  were  made  to  fight  in  the  view  of  the  Ro- 
man people. 

It  is  an  instructive  circumstance  that  those  writers  who  give  us 
the  most  heart-stirring  description  of  battles  always  stop  short  at 
the  point  at  which  the  battle  is  ended.  It  is  needful  far  the  object 
which  they  have  in  view  to  interest  us  in  warlike  achievements, 
which  compose  so  fearfully  large  a  portion  of  the  matter  of  his- 
tory ;  but  when  they  have  carried  us  through  the  thickest  of  the 
fight  to  the  point  at  which  the  shout  of  victory  is  raised  by  the 


CONSIDERED  AS  A  FALLEN  BEING.  265 

one  party,  and  the  other  party  are  seen  flying  before  their  victors, 
they  find  it  needful  to  let  fall  the  curtain  when  our  eyes  are  about 
to  rest  on  the  bodies  of  the  dying  and  the  dead.  A  walk  over  the 
field  of  battle  a  day  or  two  after  the  conflict  is  closed,  about  the 
time  when  the  carrion  scenting  the  battle  now  over,  as  the  war- 
horse  is  said  to  scent  it  beforehand,  begin  to  pay  their  visits,  might 
serve  to  dissipate  the  illusions  which  the  pomp  and  circumstance 
of  war  have  gathered  around  all  military  exploits.  We  have  read 
the  description  by  an  eminent  surgeon  of  the  field  of  Waterloo, 
visited  by  him  a  short  time  after  the  battle,  sufficient  to  affect 
every  sensitive  mind  with  sentiments  of  deepest  disgust  at  war, 
as  deep  as  that  bodily  emotion  which  he  felt  when  his  nostrils 
were  saluted  by  the  polluted  atmosphere,  and  his  eyes  fell  on  the 
blood,  now  cold  and  clotted,  that  had  streamed  from  the  hearts  of 
thousands,  whose  mangled  remains  lay  exposed  in  the  face  of 
heaven.  Historians  are  riot  careful  to  tell  us  how  the  shout  of 
triumph  has  often  been  answered  back,  and  all  but  drowned  by 
the  wailings  of  the  wounded  and  dying.  They  describe  the  re- 
joicings arid  processions  of  the  victorious  nation,  and  the  triumph 
given  to  their  general ;  but  they  do  not  conduct  us  to  the  abodes 
of  the  widows,  who  are  mourning  over  husbands  who  died  with 
none  to  staunch  their  wounds  or  close  their  eyes,  and  orphans,  all 
the  more  to  be  pitied,  because  they  are  unconscious  of  the  loss 
which  they  have  sustained.  The  moralist  must  needs  supply 
what  the  writers  of  the  school  of  romance  feel  that  they  dare  not 
describe  without  depriving  their  writings  of  half  their  charm,  and 
must  paint  the  miseries  which  wars  have  generally  brought  in 
their  train,  in  industry  checked,  in  the  arts  neglected,  in  countries 
depopulated,  in  famine  propagating  itself  in  widening  circles,  and 
pestilence  showing  itself  a  more  potent  destroyer  of  men,  than  the 
conqueror  who  boasts  of  the  victory. 

We  are  quite  aware  that  such  toil,  such  wars,  nay,  that  such 
misery  are  needful ;  and  that  if  we  could  take  them  away  we 
would  not  better,  but  rather  deteriorate  man's  condition.  We  ac- 
knowledge that  he  would  have  been  more  wretched  than  he  is,  if 
he  had  not  been  placed  in  circumstances  which  compel  him  to 
exert  himself  in  bodily  or  mental  labor.  There  may  have  been 
mercy  as  well  as  judgment  in  that  act  of  God  by  which  he  drove 
fallen  man  out  of  paradise.  With  man's  present  nature,  an  Eden 
would  not  have  been  suited  to  him  as  a  place  of  habitation :  so 
situatedj  he  had  been  obliged,  under  ever-recurring  ennui,  to  say 


266 


ADAPTATION    OF    THIS    WORLD    TO    MAN, 


with  Shenstone,  in  the  midst  of  the  earthly  paradise  in  which  he 
embowered  himself,  to  lead  there  an  existence  as  useless  as  it  was 
wretched, — "  Every  little  uneasiness  is  sufficient  to  introduce  a 
whole  train  of  melancholy  considerations,  and  to  make  rne  utterly 
dissatisfied  with  the  life  which  I  now  lead,  and  the  life  which  I 
foresee  I  shall  lead."  We  are  convinced,  besides,  that  if  a  man 
were  not  obliged  to  toil  for  his  bodily  sustenance  and  comfort,  his 
native  restlessness  would  impel  him  to  deeds  which  would  throw 
society  into  hopeless  disorder,  and  deluge  the  earth  with  blood. — 

"  That  like  an  emmet  thou  must  ever  toil, 
Is  a  sad  sentence  of  an  ancient  date — 
And  certes,  there  is  for  it  reason  great ; 
For  though  it  sometimes  makes  thee  weep  and  wail, 
And  curse  thy  stars,  and  early  rise  and  late, 
Withouten  that  would  come  an  heavier  bale, 
Loose  life,  unruly  passions,  and  diseases  pale."* 

We  are  also  aware  that  wars,  whilst  at  all  times  evils  in  them- 
selves, are  often  necessary  evils,  necessary  to  save  nations  from 
intolerable  oppression  and  bondage,  to  which  human  ambition 
would  subject  them.  We  believe  farther,  that  were  all  liability  to 
bodily  suffering  taken  away,  this  world  would  teem  with  crime 
ending  in  the  most  excruciating  mental  anguish.  We  are  con- 
vinced that  man's  exposure  to  bodily  pain  saves  him  from  much 
torture  of  mind,  and  from  vice  which  would  render  this  world 
more  offensive  to  pure  spirits  than  the  most  infected  lazar-house 
is  to  the  man  of  sensitive  organs  and  feelings. 

Speaking  of  labor,  Carlyle  says,  "  How  as  a  free-flowing  chan- 
nel, dry  and  torn  by  noble  force  through  the  sour  mud-swamp  of 
one's  existence,  like  an  ever-deepening  river,  there  it  runs  and 
flows,  draining  off  the  sour  festering  water  from  the  roots  of  the 
remotest  grass  blade,  making,  instead  of  pestilential  swamp,  a 
green  fruitful  meadow,  with  its  ever-flowing  stream.  How  blessed 
for  the  meadow  itself,  let  the  stream  and  its  value  be  great  or 
small."  t  But  whence,  we  ask,  this  mud-swamp  and  sour  fester- 
ing waters  requiring  such  a  force-torn  channel  to  carry  them  off? 
Man  must  labor  hard  in  this  world  to  ward  off  evils  ready  to  at- 
tack him,  as  the  Kamschatkan  must  exercise  himself  to  keep  his 
frame  warm.  But  why  ?  Because  both  one  and  other  are  in  an 
ungenial  clime.  We  know7  that  it  is  ordained  of  God  that  a  cer- 

*  Thomson's  Castle  of  Indolence.  f  Past  and  Present. 


CONSIDERED  AS  A  FALLEN  BEING.  267 

tain  amount  of  pleasure  should  attend  on  labor;  but  still,  it  is 
by  a  kind  of  after-appointment,  and  as  a  recompense  for  evil,  as 
Venus  was  given  to  Vulcan,  and  the  union,  after  all,  is  far  from 
being  close  or  constant. 

Acknowledging  the  necessity  of  such  evils,  we  ask  whence  this 
necessity  ?  In  the  very  nature  of  things,  says  some  one.  We 
meet  the  declaration  by  a  direct  contradiction.  Surely  it  is  pos- 
sible for  God  to  create  and  govern  a  world  in  which  there  are  no 
such  necessary  evils,  because  there  is  no  evil  at  all.  Whence,  we 
again  ask,  this  necessity  ?  From  the  state  and  character  of  man, 
is  the  answer  to  which  we  must  at  last  come.  Such  is  the  native 
temper  and  spirit  of  man,  that  if  not  constrained  to  be  busy,  he 
would  be  wretched  and  vicious  beyond  endurance.  Such  is  the 
very  nature  of  man,  that  wars,  pestilences,  and  famines  are  neces- 
sary to  prevent  evils  greater  than  themselves. 

But  what  a  dark  and  melancholy  picture  is  thus  given  of  the 
heart  and  character  of  man  ?  God  indicates  the  view  he  takes  of 
man's  character  by  the  way  in  which  he  treats  him.  How  great 
the  folly  that  needs  such  correctives  !  How  fearful  the  disease 
which  requires  such  remedies  !  How  daring  the  criminality,  when 
it  demands  from  a  God,  whose  benevolence  is  infinite,  such  chains 
to  bind  it,  a*id  prison  walls  to  confine  !  The  evils  must  be  great 
beyond  measurement,  which  demand  evils  acknowledged  to  be  so 
great  to  counteract,  restrain,  and  punish  them. 


SECTION  VI— EXPLANATION  OF  THE  MYSTERIES  OF  DIVINE  PROVI- 
DENCE, FURNISHED  BY  THE  SINFULNESS  OF  MAN'S  CHARACTER. 

"  One  would  imagine,"  says  the  representative  of  scepticism,  in 
Hume's  Dialogues  on  Natural  Religion,*  "  that  this  world  had  not 
received  the  last  hand  of  the  maker,  so  little  finished  is  every  part, 
and  so  coarse  are  the  strokes  with  which  it  is  executed.  Thus 
the  winds  are  requisite  to  convey  the  vapors  along  the  surface  of 
the  globe,  and  to  assist  men  in  navigation  ;  but  how  oft,  rising  up 
to  tempests  and  hurricanes,  do  they  become  pernicious  ?  Rains 
are  necessary  to  nourish  all  the  plants  and  animals  of  the  earth  ; 
but  how  often  are  they  defective? — how  often  excessive?  Heat 
is  requisite  to  all  life  and  vegetation,  but  it  is  not  always  found  in 
due  proportion.  On  the  mixture  and  secretion  of  the  humours 
and  juices  of  the  body  depend  the  health  and  prosperity  of  the 

*  Part  XL 


268  THE    MYSTERIES    OF    DIVINE    PROVIDENCE, 

animal ;  but  the  parts  perform  not  regularly  their  proper  func- 
tions." A  living  philosopher  of  a  different  school,  founding  on 
such  observations,  boldly  declares,  that  even  human  wisdom  could 
improve  the  universe,  which  he  therefore  maintains  can  afford  no 
proof  of  Divine  wisdom  ;  and  as  evidence  of  his  assertion,  he  re- 
fers to  certain  delicate  organs  of  the  body  as  the  eye  and  liver,  so 
apt  to  go  wrong,  and  which  could  easily  have  had  substituted  for 
them  an  organ  not  liable  to  disease.  "  It  cannot  be  doubted,  as 
it  appears  to  me,  that  scientific  genius,  even  in  biology,  is  suffici- 
ently developed  and  emancipated  to  enable  us  to  conceive  after 
the  laws  of  biology  of  certain  organizations  which  differ  notably 
from  all  those  which  we  know,  and  which  shall  be  incontestably 
superior  to  them  in  the  point  of  view  in  question,  without  these 
ameliorations  being  inevitably  compensated  in  other  respects  by 
equivalent  imperfections/'*  The  common  answer  to  these  objec- 
tions, that  the  evils  referred  to  are  the  incidental  results  of  general 
laws  good  in  themselves,  we  cannot  hold  to  be  adequate ;  for  we 
have  seen  that  God  can  arrange  his  general  laws  so  as  to  make 
one  law  counteract  the  evil  that  would  flow  from  the  unbending 
operation  of  another.  As  Hume  remarks,  "  A  being  who  knows 
the  secret  springs  of  the  universe,  might  easily,  by  particular  vo- 
litions, turn  all  these  accidents  to  the  good  of  "mankind."  We 
must  regard  these  supposed  evils  as  following  from  the  arrange- 
ments of  heaven,  just  as  much  as  the  physical  blessings.  We 
must  see  God  in  the  hurricane,  as  well  as  in  the  gentler  breezes — 
in  the  floods,  as  well  as  the  softer  showers — in  the  scorching 
drought,  as  well  as  in  the  genial  heat — in  disease,  as  well  as  in 
health.  So  far  as  these  evils  are  merely  physical,  or  bear  a  phy- 
sical aspect,  or  are  connected  with  other  physical  phenomena, 
they  are  not  evils.  In  itself,  and  apart  from  its  relation  to  man, 
on  whom  it  may  inflict  pain,  or  whose  plans  it  may  disturb,  the 
tempest  is  no  more  an  evil  than  the  calm.  It  is  simply  in  their 
reference  to  man,  that  these  parts  of  nature  become  apparent 
evils.  Now,  we  think  that  we  may  discover  in  the  nature  and 
character  of  man,  in  reference  to  whom  it  is  supposed  that  they 
are  evils,  the  ground  on  which  the  infliction  of  them  proceeds. 
Such  is  the  character  of  man,  that  it  is  needful  to  have  the  storm, 
as  well  as  the  zephyr — the  drought  and  the  deluge,  as  well  as  the 
beneficent  shower — and  sudden  failures  in  our  bodily  organism 
and  lengthened  disease,  as  well  as  health  and  the  buoyant  flow 

*  PhiL  Pos.  vol.  iii.  p.  463. 


EXPLAINED    BY    SINFULNE8S    OP    MANJS    CHARACTER.       269 

of  the  animal  spirits.  Does  it  not  appear  as  if  the  mysteries  of 
the  physical  government  of  God  could  be  all  explained  by  their 
reference  to  the  character  of  man  ?  We  wonder  that  there  should 
be  such  sudden  calamities  and  judicial  inflictions.  But  the  true 
wonder  would  be,  the  character  of  man  being  thus  degraded, 
were  God  to  rule  this  world  as  if  it  had  never  fallen.  All  these 
occurrences  seem  strange  and  mysterious,  only  on  the  supposi- 
tion that  man  is  spotlessly  pure.  Take  with  us  the  fact  that 
man  has  rebelled  against  God,  and  these  difficulties  instantly 
vanish. 

Two  evils  exist  in  this  world — the  one  physical  and  the  other 
moral — the  evil  of  pain  and  the  evil  of  sin.  We  discovar  that 
these  are  evils  by  the  very  constitution  of  the  human  mind,  which 
shrinks  from  pain  and  condemns  transgression.  The  existence 
of  these  two  evils  forms  the  grand  mystery  of  the  universe  ;  nor 
have  all  the  ingenious  theories  which  have  been  constructed  been 
successful  in  removing  the  difficulties  which  press  upon  the 
subject. 

Of  these  two  evils,  physical  evil  is  the  one  which  seerns  to  bear 
hardest  against  the  Divine  government.  Not  that  it  is  the  worst 
of  the  two,  but  it  is  the  one  with  which  God  has  the  most  imme- 
diate concern.  The  blame  of  the  moral  evil  may  undoubtedly  be 
cast  on  the  individual  who  commits  it.  To  deny  this,  were  to 
deny  the  possibility  of  free  agency  and  responsibility  on  the  part  of 
the  creature.  It  is  surely  possible  for  God  to  give  free  agency  to 
an  intelligent  creature ;  and  such  a  free  agency  as  implies  accoun- 
tability ;  and  the  creature,  when  so  endowed,  cannot  throw  the 
blame  of  the  sin  he  commits  upon  another.  But  the  infliction  of 
pain  proceeds  directly  from  God ;  and  the  blame  of  it,  if  blame 
there  be,  must  lie  upon  him.  He  who  would  justify  the  ways  of 
God  to  man,  must  be  careful  to  defend  the  Divine  government  at 
the  point  at  which  suffering  is  inflicted. 

When  we  consult  the  constitution  of  man,  we  find  it  declaring 
that  there  are  two  evils  in  this  world — the  physical  and  the  moral. 
But  while  both  are  evils,  the  mind  looks  upon  them  in  two  very  dif- 
ferent lights.  It  avoids  the  one,  but  it  pronounces  its  condemnation 
upon  the  other.  Not  only  so,  but  it  indicates  in  a  way  not  to  be 
misunderstood,  that  physical  evil  is  the  natural  consequence  and 
punishment  of  moral  evil.  The  guilty  man  stands  in  constant 
fear  of  a  penalty  to  follow ;  and  the  conscience  approves  of  appro- 
priate punishment  being  inflicted  on  sin.  Such  is  the  very  con- 


270  THE    MYSTERIES    OP    DIVINE    PROVIDENCE, 

stitution  of  man's  nature.  It  not  only  declares  sin  to  be  an  evil, 
and  pain  to  be  an  evil,  but  declares  that  the  one  is  the  proper  pun* 
ishment  of  the  other.  It  seems,  then,  as  if  we  could  get  rid  of 
many  of  the  difficulties  connected  with  the  inflictidn  of  pain,  pro- 
vided we  could  refer  it  to  moral  evil  as  its  source. 

In  this  view,  we  are  to  regard  the  infliction  of  pain  as  the  proper 
punishment  of  guilt.  This>  we  are  aware,  is  somewhat  different 
from  the  view  commonly  adopted  by  the  superficial  thinkers  of 
this  age.  They  justify  the  infliction  of  suffering  on  the  ground  of 
its  ultimately  producing  a  greater  amount  of  happiness ;  and  they 
speak  as  if  happiness  were  the  only  good,  and  pain  the  only  evil 
But  certainly  this  is  not  the  view  sanctioned  by  the  intuitive 
and  fundamental  principles  of  man's  nature.  Place  man  in  a 
position  in  which  he  must  choose  between  sin  and  pain,  and  the 
mind  will  at  once  announce  that  the  latter  should  be  the  alter- 
native adopted.  The  mind,  in  short,  declares  that  there  is  a 
greater  good  than  mere  happiness,  and  a  greater  evil  than  pain. 

The  spirit  of  the  present  age  is  much  opposed  to  everything 
punitive.  It  is  the  natural  recoil  of  the  human  mind  from  the 
barbarities,  the  cruelty,  and  revenge  of  former  generations.  The 
general  rule  is  now  laid  down,  that  human  punishment  ought  to 
be  strictly  reformatory,  and  have  in  view  solely  the  welfare  of  the 
individual  and  of  society.  Now,  we  are  not  disposed  to  cavil  at 
this  principle.  We  tremble  at  the  idea  of  man  being  made  the 
avenger  of  the  laws  of  the  Governor  of  the  universe.  The  magis- 
trate has  no  doubt  a  delegated  power  from  heaven  ;  but  it  were 
as  safe,  to  say  the  least  of  it,  in  him  to  confine  its  exercise  within 
the  limits  prescribed  by  the  principle  that  the  reformation  of  so- 
ciety should  be  his  end  and  aim.  But  there  is  a  previous  inquiry, 
is  it  allowable  that  the  magistrate  punish  except  when  the  punish* 
ment  is  deserved  ?  We  hold  it  to  be  demonstrable,  that  he  is  not 
at  liberty  to  punisht  except  when  a  crime  meriting  punishment 
has  been  committed.  He  is  not  permitted,  it  is  manifest,  to  inflict 
pain  merely  for  the  good  of  society  ;  to  visit,  for  instance,  with  im- 
prisonment or  death  an  individual  who  had  innocently  committed 
an  injurious  act.  True  it  is  that  he  does  not  punish  sin,  simply 
as  sin,  (for  this  is  the  prerogative  of  God,)  but  rather  because  it 
has  inflicted  injury  on  society ;  but  it  is  also  true,  that  he  dare  not 
impose  penalties,  except  where  guilt  has  been  contracted.  Thus 
in  the  very  power  delegated  to,  and  exercised  by,  the  magistrate, 
we  discover  traces  of  the  connection  between  sin  and  suffering. 


EXPLAINED    BY    SINFULNESS    OF    MAN*S    CHARACTER.      271 

But  because  punishment,  inflicted  by  man,  aims  at  reformation, 
it  does  not  therefore  follow  that  this  must  be  the  sole  end  of 
punishment  inflicted  by  God.  God  may  not  choose  to  delegate  to 
man  a  power  of  punishment  which  he  has  no  right  himself  to  in- 
flict, and  which  he  would  most  certainly  abuse  if  it  were  entrusted 
to  him.  But  as  God  has  this  power,  and  our  moral  nature  jus- 
tifies him  in  exercising  it,  he  may  himself  use  it  in  his  holy 
government.  It  is  only  on  the  supposition  that  he  does  use  it, 
that  we  can  justify  to  our  moral  nature  the  dealings  of  God  in 
inflicting  such  wide-spread  misery  upon  mankind.  Without 
taking  this  circumstance  into  account,  we  feel  as  if  we  could  not 
justify  the  method  of  God's  government  to  the  nature  which  God 
has  implanted  within  us. 

We  justify  the  infliction  of  suffering  upon  man,. on  the  ground 
of  the  existence  of  moral  evil;  and  we  throw  the  blame  of  the 
moral  evil  upon  the  individual  who  commits  it.  But  does  some 
one  say,  that  our  feelings  rise  against  this  view  ? — we  reply,  that 
there  are  more  solid  principles  in  the  human  mind  than  mere 
floating  feelings — and  it  is  to  these  that  we  appeal.  Is  it  insisted 
that  we  justify  all  this  to  the  reason? — we  answer,  that  there  are 
questions  involved  which  do  not  come  directly  under  the  cogni- 
zance of  the  reason,  any  more  than  questions  of  taste,  or  of  the 
beauty  and  deformity  of  objects.  We  reckon  it  enough  to  justify 
the  moral  character  of  God  to  that  moral  faculty  which  God  has 
placed  in  our  breast,  and  placed  there  for  this  very  purpose,  that 
it  may  judge  of  actions  and  of  character. 

That  faculty  now  falls  under  our  notice. 


METHOD  OF  THE  DIVINE  GOVERNMENT, 


BOOK  THIRD. 

PARTICULAR  INQUIRY  INTO  THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  THE  HUMAN 
MIND  THROUGH  WHICH  GOD  GOVERNS  MANKIND. 

WE  are  now  to  turn  from  the  world  around  to  the  world  within 
us — truly  the  larger  and  more  wonderful  of  the  two  ;  for  every 
one  of  its  thoughts  is  in  its  very  nature  more  elevated  than  the 
most  exalted  of  material  objects,  and  its  imaginations  reach  infi- 
nitely farther  than  the  bodily  eye,  assisted  by  the  telescope,  can 
range.  This  latter  world,  however,  submits  itself  to  examination 
more  reluctantly  than  the  other.  When  we  would  catch  it  in 
any  one  state  of  thought  or  feeling,  we  find  that  in  the  very  act 
we  have  so  far  modified  the  thought  and  feeling,  and  that  Pro- 
teus-like they  change  their  form  when  we  are  about  to  seize  them. 
Its  living  feelings  die  under  our  hand  as  we  would  direct  them. 
In  order  to  detect  its  workings,  we  must  use  greater  skill  than 
Huber  did  when,  after  trying  device  upon  device,  he  succeeded  at 
last  in  finding  the  way  in  which  bees  construct  their  ingenious 
work.  We  cannot  at  every  time  invert  our  eye  and  look  into  this 
deep.  It  cannot  be  inspected  when  it  is  muddy  with  earthly  in- 
gredients, and  chafed  with  passion.  Still,  there  are  times  when, 
calm  and  serene  as  a  placid  lake  in  summer,  we  can  see  far  down 
into  its  depths  and  behold  its  thronging  and  exhaustless  treasures. 
u  Its  facts,"  says  Cousin,  "are  complicated,  fugitive,  obscure,  and 
all  but.  beyond  the  power  of  apprehension  from  their  deep  seat  in 
the  mind ;"  but  he  adds,  "  the  consciousness  which  is  applied  to 
them  is  an  instrument  of  extreme  delicacy,  it  is  a  microscope  ap- 
plied to  things  infinitely  small."  By  the  help,  too,  of  what  Brown 
calls  a  brief  act  of  the  memory,  we  can  recall,  with  the  view  of 


THE    WILL,    OR    THE    OPTATIVE    FACULTY.  273 

inspecting  them,  the  thoughts  and  feelings  which  passed  through 
the  mind,  even  when  most  agitated.  Nor  is  it  to  be  forgotten 
that  we  can,  to  some  extent,  experiment  upon  the  mind,  and  pre- 
sent objects  fitted  to  call  its  powers  into  operation  that  we  may 
behold  them  in  exercise. 

In  a  Treatise  like  this,  however,  it  is  not  needful  to  investigate 
the  human  mind  any  farther  than  may  be  requisite  to  discover  its 
relation  to  God  the  governor  of  the  universe.  We  do  not  require 
to  take  a  survey  of  all  its  powers,  or  to  enter  upon  any  subtle  or 
minute  analysis  of  them.  Our  attention  is  to  be  very  much  con- 
fined to  those  principles  through  which  God  governs,  or  may  be 
supposed  to  govern  mankind.  As  in  the  last  book  we  took  a  sur- 
vey of  the  works  and  laws  of  God  in  their  reference  to  man,  we 
are  now  to  contemplate  the  human  mind  in  its  relation  to  God  as 
its  governor. 


CHAPTER  I. 
MAN'S  ORIGINAL  AND   INDESTRUCTIBLE  MORAL  NATURE. 

SECTION  I.— THE  WILL,  OR  THE   OPTATIVE  FACULTY.— CONDITIONS 
OF  RESPONSIBILITY. 

ON  taking  a  survey  of  the  human  soul,  with  the  view  of  dis- 
covering its  attributes,  we  are  struck  first  of  all  with  certain  fac- 
ulties which  enable  us  to  form  an  apprehension  or  conception  of 
existing  things,  material  and  mental.  They  may  be  called  the 
facukies  of — 

I.  SIMPLE  APPREHENSION  OR  CONCEPTION. 

They  are  such  as  these. — (1.)  Perception,  which  gives  us  a  con- 
ception of  material  objects.  (2.)  Consciousness,  or  internal  per- 
ception, called  also  by  Locke,  reflection,  which  gives  us  a  concep- 
tion of  mental  states.  (3.)  Memory,  or  the  reproductive  faculty, 
which  recalls  both  of  the  above. 

Jn  the  exercise  of  the  first  of  these,  we  conceive  of  objects  as 
existing  in  space.  In  the  exercise  of  the  third,  we  conceive  of 
them  as  occupying  time.  The  first  of  these  gives  us  the  external 
world,  and  the  second  the  internal  world  ;  and  by  the  three  we 
have  the  rude  materials  of  all  our  knowledge. 

II.  There  are  the  POWERS  OF  IMAGINATION,  by  which  we  con- 

18 


274 

reive  of   mental  and  material  objects  in  new  and  non-existing 
forms,  and  that  either  by  increase  or  decrease. 
Above  these  simple  faculties  we  have- 
Ill.  The  REASON,  discovering  the  relations  of  things,  and  de- 
termining the  true  and  the  false  ;  and — 

IV.  The  MORAL  FACULTY,  determining  the  morally  right  and 
wrong. 

Intimately  connected  with  these  faculties  we  have — 

V.  The  EMOTIONS,  or  the  sensibility,  lively  or  dull,  pleasurable 
or  painful,  attached  to  our  mental  states. 

VI.  The  WILL,  OR  OPTATIVE  POWER,  fixing  among  the  ob- 
jects presented  to  the  mind  on  certain  ones  as  to  be  chosen. 

We  do  not  pretend  that  the  above  is  a  complete  exhibition  of 
all  the  attributes  of  the  human  soul ;  but  we  believe  it  to  be  im- 
possible, with  consciousness  as  our  informant,  to  resolve  any  one 
of  these  powers  into  any  others,  or  all  the  others.  Any  proposed 
analysis  of  them  into  one  another,  or  into  simpler  elements,  will 
turn  out,  if  narrowly  examined,  to  be  delusive,  and  to  derive  its 
plausibility  not  from  explaining  but  overlooking  the  peculiarities 
of  the  faculty. 

Fixing  our  attention  on  the  last  mentioned,  the  power  of  the 
will,  we  hold  that  it  cannot  be  resolved  into  any  one  of  the  others, 
or  all  of  them  combined.  The  other  powers,  such  as  the  sensi- 
bility, the  reason,  and  the  moral  faculty,  may  influence  the  will, 
but  they  cannot  constitute  it,  or  yield  its  peculiar  workings.  Ac- 
cording to  the  consciousness,  if  we  rightly  interpret  it,  the  will  is 
as  separate  from  all  the  other  powers  as  they  are  separate  from 
one  another.  We  hold  that  there  cannot  be  an  undertaking  more 
perilous  to  the  best  interests,  of  philosophy  and  humanity  than 
the  attempt  to  resolve  the  will  into  mere  sensibility,  or  anything 
inferior  to  itself.  A  man  has  only  to  read  his  own  consciousness, 
as  the  will  is  working,  to  discover  the  exercise  of  a  power  which, 
though  intimately  connected  with  the  other  faculties  of  the  mind, 
even  as  these  are  intimately  connected  with  each  other,  does  yet 
stand  out  distinctly  from  them,  with  its  separate  provirree  and 
functions. 

All  our  older  moralists  and  divines  were  accustomed  to  speak 
of  the  will  as  a  separate  attribute  of  the  human  mind.  Later 
metaphysicians,  in  the  natural  recoil  against  the  excessive  multi- 
plication of  original  principles  in  olden  times,  have  gone  to  a 
worse  extreme  than  that  which  they  sought  to  avoid,  and  in  par- 


THE    WILL,    OR  THE    OPTATIVE    FACULTY.  275 

ticular  have  sought  to  resolve  the  will  into  something  else,  com- 
monly the  mere  sensibility,  or  the  emotional  part  of  man's  nature. 
In  the  writings  of  the  French  school  of  Condillac,  and  of  Brown, 
Mill,  and  their  followers  in  this  country,  we  find  wish  and  desire 
'  represented  as  emotions,  and  volition  spoken  of  as  the  prevailing 
desire.  Already,  however,  we  begin  to  discover  the  proper  reac- 
tion from  what  we  must  regard  as  this  over-refinement  in  analy- 
sis. Biran,  followed  by  Cousin,  Jouffroy,  and  others  in  France, 
have  distinctly  recognised  the  importance  of  the  will  as  an  unre- 
solvable  and  independent  faculty.  Di\  Chalmers,  Dr.  Payne,  and 
others  in  this  country,  while  they  still  speak  of  desire  as  a  mere 
emotion,  take  pains  to  show  that  volition  is  something  more  than 
mere  desire.  But  these  last  writers,  while  they  have  taken  voli- 
tion from  the  category  of  common  emotions,  have  not  told  us 
expressly  what  is  its  nature,  whether  they  regard  it  still  as  an 
emotion,  or  an  isolated  state  of  mind  capable  of  being  classified 
with  no  other, 

We  think  it  high  time  that  writers  on  mental  science  should 
be  prepared  to  admit  that  there  is  a  separate  class  of  states  of 
mind,  which,  for  want  of  a  better,  we  may  call  by  the  generic 
term  WILL,  or.  as  we  should  prefer,  the  OPTATIVE  states  of 
mind. 

The  error  of  Condillac  in  his  specious,  but,  after  all,  superfi- 
cial analysis,  consisted  in  supposing  that  when  he  had  pointed 
out  the  circumstances  in  which  any  mental  state  arose,  he  had 
demonstrated  that  affection  to  be  of  the  same  order  as  the  cir- 
cumstances or  state  in  which  it  had  originated.  Hence  he  re- 
garded all  ideas  as  transformed  sensations,  because  they  origi- 
nated in  sensations,  thus  mistaking  occasions  for  causes,  or  as 
we  would  express  it,  leaving  out  the  main  element  in  the  com- 
plex cause.  Those  who  have  sought  to  resolve  the  will  into 
something  else  have  proceeded  on  the  same  false  principle,  and 
fallen  into  the  same  error.  Because  wishes,  desires,  and  voli- 
tions pre-suppose  intellectual  conceptions  and  emotions,  it  is 
rashly  concluded  that  they  are  nothing  but  intellectual  concep- 
tions or  emotions.  No  doubt  they  are  intimately  connected  with 
the  intellectual  states  of  mind  on  the  one  hand,  and  emotional 
attachments  on  the  other,  but  they  contain  a  something  which 
can  be  resolved  into  neither  the  one  nor  the  other,  nor  into  both 
combined. 

Appealing  to  consciousness,  we  assert  that  there  is  a  class  of 


276 


THE    WILL,    OR  THE    OPTATIVE    FACULTY. 


mental  states  embracing  wishes,  desires,  volitions,  which  cannot 
be  analyzed  into  anything  else.  These  mental  states  or  affec- 
tions are  very  numerous,  and  occupy  a  place  in  the  human  mind 
second  to  no  other.  They  differ  from  each  other  in  degree,  and 
possibly  even  in  some  minor  qualities,  but  they  all  agree  in  other 
and  more  important  respects,  and  so  are  capable  of  being  arranged 
under  one  head. 

Take,  for  instance,  a  wish,  the  earnest  wish  that  this  dear  friend 
at  present  in  ill  health  may  recover.  Every  one  will  admit  that 
there  is  more  here  than  mere  intellect.  No  doubt  there  is  intellect, 
the  conception  of  the  friend  in  certain  circumstances,  and  the  possi- 
bility of  his  being  in  other  circumstances ;  but  it  will  be  readily 
acknowledged  that  there  is  more  than  mere  intellectual  conception. 
We  proceed  a  step  farther,  and  affirm  that  there  is  more  than  mere 
emotion,  than  a  mere  glow  of  heart,  or  feeling  of  delight  and  at- 
tachment. There  is  all  this,  but  there  is  something  more,  which 
the  glow  or  the  attachment  may  be  fitted  to  produce,  (in  a  mind 
capable  of  desire^)  but  which  it  cannot  constitute.  Just  as  the 
intellectual  conception  of  our  friend  is  fitted  to  raise  the  emotion 
which,  however,  is  something  more  than  the  intellectual  conception, 
so  the  emotion  is  fitted  to  raise  the  desire,  which  desire,  however, 
contains  an  element  not  in  the  emotion.  It  is  not  difficult  to  con- 
ceive of  a  mind  having  the  emotion,  and  yet  incapable  of  the 
desire.  Just  as  it  is  possible  to  conceive  of  a  being  with  intellect 
without  emotions,  so  it  is  possible  to  conceive  of  a  being  possessed 
of  sensibility  without  being  able  to  form  a  volition  or  even  a  wish. 
The  nerves  of  motion  in  the  bodily  frame  do  not  differ  more  from 
the  muscles  of  mere  sensation  than  do  the  volitions  and  desires  of 
the  mind  from  the  mere  feelings  of  delight,  interest,  and  attach- 
ment, experienced  in  what  are  called  emotions. 

Later  mental  inquirers  are  generally  disposed  to  admit  that  the 
volition,  the  positive  determination  to  take  a  particular  step,  the 
resolution,  for  instance,  to  give  a  sum  of  money  to  take  our  friend 
to  a  warmer  climate  for  the  restoration  of  his  health,  is  more  than 
a  mere  emotion.  But  if  we  are  thus  to  constitute  a  separate  attri- 
bute to  which  to  refer  volition,  it  is  worthy  of  being  inquired, 
whether  we  should  not  arrange  under  the  same  head,  wishes, 
desires,  and  the  cognate  states  as  being  more  closely  allied  in  their 
nature  to  volition  than  to  the  common  emotions. 

Wherever  there  is  wish,  we  hold  that  there  is  more  than  mere 
emotion — more  than  a  mere  receptive  state  of  the  soul ;  there  is 


THE    WILL,    OR  THE    OPTATIVE    FACULTY.  277 

an  active  exercise  of  the  mind.  Whenever  we  go  beyond  the  in- 
dicative or  the  subjunctive  to  the  optative  mood,  we  come  into  the 
region  of  a  higher  attribute.  As  long  as  we  dwell  with  pain  on 
the  contemplation  of  our  friend  in  distress,  or  with  pleasure  on  his 
anticipated  recovery,  there  is  evidently  nothing  but  emotion.  But 
we  take  a  farther  step,  a  most  important  step — a  step  which,  when 
we  take  it.  demonstrates  that  we  are  higher  in  the  scale  of  being 
—when  we  positively  wish  that  our  friend  may  recover. 

It  is  the  will  which  determines  what  is  to  be  preferred  or  re- 
jected— what  is  good,  and  what  is  not  good.  Doubtless  the  other 
powers  of  the  mind  must  furnish  the  objects.  The  physical  or 
mental  sensibility  must  announce  what  is  painful  and  what  is 
pleasurable  ;  the  conscience  declares  what  is  morally  right,  and 
what  is  morally  wrong ;  the  reason  may  proclaim  what  is  true, 
and  what  is  false ;  but  it  is  not  the  province  of  one  or  all  these  to 
make  the  choice.  By  the  sensibility,  the  mind  feels  pleasure  and 
pain  ;  but  it  is  another  power  which  chooses  the  former  and  avoids 
the  latter.  To  show  that  the  two  are  distinct,  let  us  put  an  ex- 
treme case.  We  can  conceive  plants  to  be  possessed  of  certain 
attachments,  (many  have  believed  them  to  be  so  ;)  and  yet  owing 
to  their  want  of  will,  they  might  be  incapable  of  choosing  any  of 
the  sensations  which  they  passively  experience.  So  far  as  the 
true  is  preferred  to  the  false,  or  the  right  to  the  wrong,  or  the 
pleasurable  to  the  right,  it  is  by  the  exercise,  not  of  the  reason,  or 
the  conscience,  or  the  sensibility,  but  of  the  will.  Nor  is  it  saying 
anything  to  the  point  to  declare,  that  the  will  always  chooses  the 
greatest  good  ;  for  it  is  the  will  that  declares  it  to  be  good,  and  the 
greatest  good.  The  will,  no  doubt,  does  prefer  the  pleasurable  in 
itself  to  the  painful,  but  it  is  because  it  wills  to  do  so.  It  may 
prefer,  as  it  ought,  the  morally  right  to  the  pleasurable ;  but  it  is 
equally  possible  it  may  prefer  the  pleasant  to  the  morally  right ; 
and  whichever  of  these  courses  it  pursues,  it  is  in  the  sovereign 
exercise  of  its  own  choice. 

We  hold  the  will  to  be  a  general  attribute  of  the  mind,  and  its 
operations  manifested  under  various  forms.  It  says  of  this  object, 
it  is  good — I  desire  it ;  it  is  evil — I  reject  it.  In  its  feeblest  form, 
it  is  simply  wish,  or  the  opposite  of  wish ;  and  according  as  it 
fixes  on  the  object  as  more  or  less  good  or  evil,  it  rises  till  it  may 
become  the  most  intense  desire  or  abhorrence.  In  its  most  decisive 
form,  it  is  resolution  or  positive  volition.  When  inconsistent  objects 
present  themselves,  and  the  mind  would  choose  both  if  it  could, 


278  THE    WILL,    OR  THE    OPTATIVE    FACULTY. 

there  may  for  a  time  be  a  clashing  or  contest.  Where  there  is  no 
clashing  of  desires,  or  where  one  of  the  contending  desires  has  pre- 
vailed, and  the  object  is  declared  to  be  better  or  best,  and  where 
it  is  also  ascertained  to  .be  attainable,  then  the  will  assumes  this 
form — I  choose  this ;  I  resolve  to  obtain  it.  This,  the  consum- 
mating step,  is  commonly  called  volition,  to  distinguish  it  from 
simple  wish  and  desire.  And  we  hold  that  it  is  the  same  attribute 
of  the  mind  which  says,  this  object  is  good,  I  wish  it,  and  desire  it : 
and  which  says,  on  there  being  no  competing  good,  or  no  good 
esteemed  as  equal  to  it,  I  choose  it. 

It  is  of  the  utmost  moment,  even  in  a  psychological  point  of 
view,  to  distinguish  between  the  emotions  and  the  will.  We  can- 
not comprehend  man's  nature  and  constitution,  without  conceiving 
of  him  as  endowed  with  more  than  a  mere  emotional  impressibility 
or  receptive  sensibility.  True,  we  admire  the  loveliness  of  man's 
emotional  nature,  more  than  we  admire  the  loveliest  scene  of 
nature's  loveliest  regions  ;  (indeed,  philosophical  analysis  informs 
us,  that  external  beauty  is  to  some  extent  a  mere  transference  of 
the  inward  feeling  to  the  physical  world.)  The  play  of  these  feel- 
ings has  to  us  an  intenser  interest  than  the  blowing  of  the  breeze, 
or  the  rush  of  waters  ;  and  the  moving  of  man's  emotional  nature, 
more  than  even  the  deep  waving  of  grain  in  summer,  is  indicative 
to  us  of  riches  and  fruitfulness.  Still,  we  stand  up  for  the  exist- 
ence of  a  higher- faculty  in  mind,  and  which,  no  doubt,  proceeding 
upon  emotion,  uses  it  all  the  while  merely  to  rise  to  the  exercise 
of  its  own  independent  functions. 

As  holding,  then,  that  the  consciousness  reveals  to  us  this  class 
of  mental  states,  we  regard  it  as  of  great  importance  that  they 
should  be  taken  into  account  in  the  study  of  mind  as  a  mere  branch 
of  science.  But  it  is  in  ethical,  more  than  in  psychological  inquiry, 
that  the  essential  importance  of  this  distinction  becomes  apparent. 
It  may  be  doubted,  whether  a  person  possessed  of  mere  emotion 
could,  in  any  circumstances,  be  regarded  as  responsible.  It  is  when 
the  element  of  the  will,  the  optative,  comes  under  the  view,  that 
we  at  once  declare  man  to  be  a  moral  and  responsible  agent. 

This  maybe  the  proper  place  for  pointing  out  what  we  conceive 
to  be  the  CONDITIONS  OF  RESPONSIBILITY. 

The  fact  that  man's  MIND  is  SELF-ACTING,  and  in  particular, 
that  the  WILL  is  SELF-ACTING,  has  its  power  or  law  in  itself,  is 
one  of  the  conditions  of  responsibility.  A  mind  led  to  feel  and 
think  by  circumstances  ah  extra^  could  not  be  a  free  agent  or 


RESPONSIBILITY    AND    FREEDOM,    ETC.  279 

accountable.  The  other  two  conditions  of  responsibility  seem  to 
be  CONSCIENCE  and  INTELLIGENCE.  There  must  be  conscience 
to  distinguish  between  the  right  and  wrong,  and  authoritatively 
declare  which  is  the  one  and  which  is  the  other.  There  must 
also  be  such  an  amount  of  intelligence  as  to  enable  the  mind  in 
the  complex  acts  of  life,  to  separate  that  which  is  moral  from  that 
which  is  indifferent.  These  three,  then,  seem  to  be  the  essential 
elements  or  conditions  of  responsibility.  Every  human  being,  in 
a  sane  state  of  mind,  is  in  possession  of  all  the  three.  The  maniac 
in  some  cases,  has  lost  the  first,  and  has  no  proper  power  of  will. 
The  idiot,  and  in  some  cases  the  maniac,  is  without  the  third,  or 
the  power  of  discovering  what  is  really  embraced  in  a  given  phe- 
nomenon. Without  the  one  or  other  of  these  necessary  adjuncts, 
there  is  no  room  for  the  right  exercise  of  the  second — that  is,  the 
conscience  ;  and  the  party  therefore  is  not  responsible.  In  the 
case  of  the  maniac,  as  soon  as  intelligence  and  the  power  of  will 
are  restored,  the  conscience  which  is  the  most  indestructible  faculty 
in  the  human  soul,  is  in  circumstances  to  renew  its  proper  opera- 
tion. 


SECTION  II.— RESPONSIBILITY  AND  FREEDOM  COMPATIBLE  WITH  THE 
CAUSAL  CONNECTION  OF  GOD  WITH  HIS  WORKS. 

WE  have  given  our  reasons  for  regarding  the  will  as  a  separate 
and  independent  attribute  of  the  soul. 

There  are  persons  who  tell  us  that  the  will  cannot  be  indepen- 
dent, for  it  is  swayed  by  motives.  But  there  is  a  prior  question 
which  these  parties  are  not  so  ready  to  answer,  what  are  we  to 
understand  by  a  motive  ?  The  most  profound  of  all  the  authors 
who  have  treated  of  this  subject,  has  indeed  given  a  reply.  "By 
motive,  I  mean  the  whole  of  that  which  moves,  excites,  or  invites 
the  mind  to  volition,  whether  that  be  one  thing  singly,  or  many 
things  conjunctly.  Many  particular  things  may  concur,  and  unite 
their  strength  to  induce  the  mind  ;  and  when  it  is  so,  all  together 
are  as  one  complex  motive.  And  when  I  speak  of  the  strongest 
motive,  I  have  respect  to  the  strength  of  the  whole  that  operates 
to  produce  a  particular  act  of  volition,  whether  that  be  the  strength 
of  one  thing  alone,  or  of  many  together."  *  We  believe  the  defi- 
nition to  be  correct,  and  the  only  possible  definition.  But  let  it  be 
observed,  how  much  is  assumed  in  it.  It  is  asserted,  that  the  will 
*  Edwards  on  the  Freedom  of  the  Will,  P.  I.  Sect.  2. 


280      RESPONSIBILITY    AND    FREEDOM    COMPATIBLE  WITH 

is  swayed  by  the  motive ;  and  when  we  ask  what  the  motive  is, 
it  is  answered,  all  that  sways  the  will.  We  are  making  no  pro- 
gress ;  we  are  swinging  upon  a  hinge,  in  advancing  and  re-advan- 
cing such  maxims.  Nor  is  it  possible  to  do  more.  For  the  truth 
is,  it  is  not  the  motive  properly  speaking,  that  determines  the 
working  of  the  will ;  but  it  is  the  will  that  imparts  the  strength  to 
the  motive.  As  Coleridge  says,  "  it  is  the  man  that  makes  the 
motive,  and  not  the  motive  the  man."  * 

But  while  we  stand  up  so  strongly  for  the  independent  existence 
and  extensive  sway  of  the  will,  as  we  would  stand  up  for  the 
separate  existence  of  the  reason,  or  any  other  faculty,  we  would 
not  have  it  supposed  that  the  will  is  unconnected  with  the  other 
faculties,  or  that  it  has  no  laws  regulating  it,  or  rather  as  we 
should  say  in  speaking  of  such  a  power,  by  which  it  regulates 
itself.  Like  all  the  other  faculties,  such  as  the  reason  and  consci- 
ence, it  works  according  to  laws.  It  prefers,  for  instance — all  other 
things  being  equal — pleasure  to  pain.  If  pain  be  set  before  it  on 
the  one  side,  and  pleasure  on  the  other,  it  will  turn  to  the  pleasure, 
and  turn  away  from  the  pain.  A  classification  of  these  laws  of 
the  will  would  give  us  what  we  may  call  the  motive  or  impelling 
powrers  or  propensities  of  the  human  soul.  We  cannot  enter  upon 
this  subject.  Our  general  meaning  will  be  understood,  when  we 
refer  to  such  laws  as  these  regulating  the  will,  or  by  which  rather 
the  will  regulates  itself: — the  primary  ones,  such  as  that  which 
leads  us  to  choose  our  own  happiness,  or  the  happiness  of  others; 
and  the  secondary  ones,  such  as  the  love  of  knowledge  or  of 
esteem. 

But  while  there  are  laws  of  the  will,  we  are  never  to  regard 
them  as  laying  any  restraint  upon  the  will.  This  would  be  a 
complete  misunderstanding  of  their  nature.  They  no  more  lay 
restraints  upon  the  will,  than  the  fundamental  laws  of  reason  and 
consciousness  trammel  these  faculties  in  the  discovery  of  what  is 
true  and  what  is  virtuous.  A  truthful  mind  may  be  incapable  of 
sanctioning  falsehood,  and  an  honorable  mind  may  be  incapable 
of  designing  a  mean  action ;  but  this,  not  because  of  any  stern 
necessity  controlling  the  will,  but  because  of  the  very  nature  of 

*  If  by  motive  is  meant  the  sum  of  all  the  causes  producing  the  final  volition,  it  is 
evident  that  the  motive  ever  determines  the  volitions  ;  but  then  in  this  sum  of  causes, 
the  main  element  is  the  will  itself.  If  by  motive  is  meant,  merely  the  causes  acting 
independently  of  the  will,  then  we  hold  that  they  do  not  determine  the  volition,  they 
merely  call  the  will  into  exercise  as  the  true  determining  power. 


THE  CAUSAL  CONNECTION  OF  GOD  WITH    HIS  WORKS.       281 

the  will  itself.  A  person  of  an  opposite  spirit  may  be  quite  as  in- 
capable of  conceiving  of  a  generous  action,  and  this  not  because 
of  any  restraint  laid  upon  the  will,  but  because  of  the  inward  de- 
pravity of  the  will.  These  laws,  which  are  just  the  rules  of  the 
action  of  the  will,  the  rules  which  it  adopts,  do  in  no  way  interfere 
with  the  freedom  of  the  will ;  they  leave  it  as  free  as  it  is  possible 
for  it  to  be,  in  any  intelligible  sense  of  the  term. 

But  still  these  facts  conduct  us  to  the  important  truth,  that  the 
law  of  cause  and  effect  reigns  in  the  will,  and  in  regard  to  the  re- 
sponsible acts  of  man,  as  it  does  in  every  other  department  of  the 
mind,  and  indeed  in  every  other  department  of  God's  works.  It 
is,  we  hold  with  all  philosophers  who  have  deeply  studied  this  sub- 
ject, a  fundamental  principle  of^our  very  constitution,  which  leads 
us  upon  the  occurrence  of  any  given  event,  to  say  it  has  a  cause. 
And  this  principle  leads  us  upon  the  occurrence  of  a  phenomenon 
to  look  out  for  something  producing  it,  whether  the  phenomenon 
be  material  or  mental.  In  regard,  for  instance,  to  any  one  thought 
or  feeling,  we  affirm  that  it  must  have  had  some  cause  in  some 
property  of  the  mind,  or  in  some  antecedent  state  of  the  mind,  or 
in  the  two  combined.  It  is  by  an  intuition  of  our  nature  that  we 
believe  that  this  thought  or  feeling  could  not  have  been  produced 
without  a  cause ;  and  that  this  same  cause  will  again  and  for  ever 
produce  the  same  effects.  And  this  intuitive  principle  leads  us  to 
expect  the  reign  of  causation,  not  only  among  the  thoughts  and 
feelings  generally,  but  among  the  wishes  and  volitions  of  the  soul. 
When  the  mind  is  cherishing  a  desire,  or  resolving  upon  a  given 
action,  here  is  a  phenomenon  of  which  we  do  believe,  and  must 
believe,  that  it  has  a  cause.  In  this  respect,  wishes,  desires, 
and  volitions  are  no  exception  to  the  absolute  rule,  which  holds 
true  of  all  other  phenomena,  spiritual  and  material.  "  This  prin- 
ciple," says  Cousin,  "is  real,  certain,  incontestable.  And  what, 
then,  are  its  characters  ?  In  the  first  place,  it  is  universal.  I  ask 
if  there  be  a  savage,  a  child,  an  old  man — a  man  in  health,  or  a 
man  under  disease — or  even  an  idiot,  provided  he  be  not  altogether 
so — who,  upon  having  presented  to  him  a  phenomenon  which 
commences  to  exist,  does  not  on  the  instant  suppose  that  there  is 
a  cause?  But  more,  not  only  do  we  so  judge  in  all  cases 

naturally,  and  by  the  instinctive  power  of  our  understanding,  but, 
try  to  judge  otherwise — try,  upon  a  phenomenon  being  presented, 
to  suppose  that  it  has  no  cause, — you  find  that  you  cannot :  the 


282      RESPONSIBILITY    AND    FREEDOM    COMPATIBLE    WITH 

principle  is  not  only  universal,  it  is  necessary."  *  Here,  then,  is  a 
wish,  a  desire,  a  volition  as  a  phenomenon ;  we  hold,  according  to 
the  above  principle,  that  we  are  naturally,  intuitively,  and  neces- 
sarily led  to  suppose  that  this  phenomenon  has  a  cause. 

The  author  now  quoted,  indeed,  tells  us  elsewhere,  "  Above  my 
will,  there  is  no  cause  to  be  sought ;  the  principle  of  causality  ex- 
pires before  the  cause  in  the  will ;  the  will  causes,  it  is  not  itself 
caused."  t  There  is  here  evidently  a  contradiction,  and  no  possi- 
bility of  a  reconciliation.  According  to  what  Cousin  holds  to  be 
a  universal  and  necessary  principle,  every  particular  act  of  the 
will,  as  a  phenomenon,  commencing  to  exist,  must  have  a  cause. 
If  it  be  said,  that  the  cause  lies  in  the  human  will  itself,  we  go 
back  to  that  human  will,  and  insist  that  it,  too,  as  a  phenomenon, 
must  have  a  cause  of  its  operation,  and  the  mode  of  it.  As  both 
asseverations  cannot  be  true,  we  must  take  our  choice.  Now,  it 
is  by  an  intuition  of  our  nature,  that  we  are  led  on  the  occurrence 
of  a  phenomenon  to  believe  in  the  existence  of  a  cause.  But  we 
are  not  led  by  any  such  principle  to  deny  that  the  phenomena  of 
the  will  have  a  cause.  But  it  is  affirmed,  that  we  are  led  by 
consciousness  to  discover  that  our  volitions  have  no  cause ;  then 
we  meet  the  assertion  with  a  direct  contradiction.  This  is  a  sub- 
ject on  which  consciousness ',  considered  in  itself,  says  nothing, 
and  can  say  nothing.  It  may  testify  in  regard  to  the  exist- 
ence or  non-existence  of  such  or  such  a  mental  state;  but  it 
can  say  nothing  directly  as  to  its  being,  or  not  being,  neces- 
sarily connected  with  some  other  phenomenon  as  its  cause.  In 
order  to  discover  whether  there  be  such  a  connection,  we  must  re- 
sort to  other  processes.  Now,  there  is  a  fundamental  principle  of 
human  reason  and  belief,  which  announces  to  us  that  our  wishes 
and  volitions,  like  everything  else,  must  have  a  cause.  Or  if  we 
resort  to  observation  founded  upon  consciousness,  it  only  confirms 
this  view.  We  discover  laws  in  the  department  of  the  will,  as  we 
discover  laws  everywhere  else.  Some  of  these  laws  we  have  al- 
ready referred  to ;  as.  for  instance,  all  other  things  being  equal— 
the  will  prefers  pleasure  to  pain.  Not  only  so,  but  we  find  the 
will  regulating  itself  by  laws,  even  in  regard  to  actions  which  are 
moral  or  immoral.  We  say  of  a  man  who  habitually  commits  mean 
and  dishonorable  actions,  that  his  conduct  proceeds  from  a  mean 
and  dishonorable  mind ;  and  unless  some  change  take  place  (of 
which  there  must  be  a  cause)  we  expect  him  to  act  in  the  same 
*  3d  Ser.  voL  iii.  pp.  154,  155.  f  1st  Ser.  voL  i  p.  342. 


THE    CAUSAL  CONNECTION  OP  GOD  WITH  HIS  WORKS.      283 

in  time  to  come.  Or  should  this  individual,  at  some  particu- 
lar time,  do  an  honorable  action,  we  still  seek  for  some  principle 
of  honor  remaining  in  the  midst  of  his  habitual  meanness,  and 
by  which  we  would  account  for  the  apparent  anomaly.  In  short, 
we  rise  from  effects  to  causes ;  and  from  causes,  we  anticipate 
effects,  in  regard  to  the  will  as  in  regard  to  everything  else.  Nor 
do  we  find  our  expectations  disappointed.  Mankind  find  the  mind 
that  is  thoroughly  honorable,  always  acting  a  thoroughly  honor- 
able part.  And  this  is  the  ground  of  the  confidence  which  we  put 
in  our  fellow-creatures.  Were  the  will  utterly  capricious,  as  some 
suppose,  then  we  could  put  no  confidence  in  a  fellow-man ;  nay, 
with  reverence  be  it  spoken,  we  could  not  put  confidence  in  God 
himself.  Mankind  do,  in  fact,  trust  in  a  person  known  to  tfe  of 
thorough  integrity,  that  he  will  always  be  upright.  So  far  as  we 
have  fears,  that  any  given  individual  may  commit  a  dishonest 
action,  it  is  because  we  are  not  sure  whether  he  is  possessed  of 
complete  integrity.  So  far  as  we  are  deceived  with  any  individual 
in  whom  we  trusted,  it  is  not  because  his  character  has  not  brought 
forth  its  proper  fruits,  but  because  we  were  deceived  in  the  esti- 
mate formed  of  his  character.  In  short,  human  observation  ex- 
pects and  finds  that  the  law  of  causality  reigns  among  the  wishes 
of  the  heart  and  the  purposes  of  the  mind,  as  it  reigns  in  every 
department  of  the  soul,  and  indeed  in  every  department  of  the 
works  of  God. 

In  prosecuting  such  inquiries  as  these,  we  find  ourselves  in  view 
of  two  truths,  which  can  be  established  on  separate  and  indepen- 
dent evidence,  and  which  must  always  be  taken  along  with  us 
in  treating  of  God's  intelligent  creatures  as  under  his  government. 
The  one  is,  that  man  is  a  free  agent,  and  morally  responsible  to 
his  Governor  ;  and  the  other  is,  that  he  is  physically  dependent 
on  his  Creator.  Each  of  these  truths  stands  on  its  separate  basis. 
The  one  can  be  established  by  consciousness  and  conscience  ;  and 
the  other  by  reason  and  observation.  Man,  on  the  one  hand,  is 
conscious  that  he  has  a  power  of  will  and  spontaneity  ;  and  his 
conscience  announces,  as  we  shall  show  in  the  succeeding  sections, 
that  he  is  responsible.  On  the  other  hand,  we  are  led  by  a  fun- 
damental law  of  belief  to  expect  the  law  of  cause  and  effect  to 
reign  in  mind  as  it  reigns  in  matter ;  and  we  actually  find  the 
operation  of  such  a  law  in  the  exercise  of  the  will.  Each  truth  is 
thus  supported  by  its  independent  evidence  ;  and  it  is  therefore 
impossible  that  the  two  can  be  inconsistent.  It  is  only  through  a 


284      RESPONSIBILITY    AND    FREEDOM    COMPATIBLE    WITH 

confusion  of  ideas,  through  confounding  the  physical  and  the 
moral,  that  superficial  thinkers  are  inclined  to  regard  them  as 
contradictory. 

If  any  man  asserts,  that  in  order  to  responsibility,  the  will  must 
be  free — that  is,  free  from  physical  restraint;  free  to  act  as  it 
pleases — we  at  once  and  heartily  agree  with  him ;  and  we  main- 
tain, that  in  this  sense  the  will  is  free,  as  free  as  it  is  possible  for 
any  man  to  conceive  it  to  be.  But  if  not  contented  with  this  ad- 
mission, he  insists  that  in  order  to  responsibility,  the  acts  of  the 
will,  and  the  will  itself,  must  be  absolutely  uncaused,  we  imme- 
diately ask  him  for  the  evidence  of  this  affirmative  proposition. 
If  he  refers  to  the  conscience  of  man  as  that  which  declares  his 
accountability,  and  asserts  that  the  conscience  intimates  that  man 
cannot  be  responsible  if  his  volitions  have  a  cause,  then  we  at 
once  meet  his  assertion  with  a  direct  contradiction.  The  con- 
science declares  man  to  be  responsible  to  God  ;  but  we  fearlessly 
assert,  that  it  attaches  no  such  qualification  as  that  now  referred 
to  as  the  condition  of  responsibility. 

We  can  produce  the  separate  proofs  of  the  two  separate  truths 
advocated  by  us  ;  and  when  looked  at  separately,  these  proofs  are 
acknowledged  to  be  irrefragable.  Should  it  be  demanded  of  us 
that  we  reconcile  them ;  we  answer,  that  we  are  not  bound  to 
offer  a  positive  reconciliation  of  them.  We  point  to  the  two  ob- 
jects;  but  we  are  not  bound  to  show  what  is  the  link  that  con- 
nects them,  or  so  much  as  to  show  that  there  is  a  link  connecting 
them.  Is  it  required  of  us  in  any  other  department  of  philosophy 
to  point  out  the  bond  which  unites  two  truths,  established  on  in- 
dependent evidence,  before  the  mind  gives  its  assent  to  them  ? 
We  do  not  require  the  physical  investigator  to  point  out  the  con- 
nection between  mechanical  and  chemical  combinations,  before 
we  believe  in  their  existence ;  we  only  require  him  to  furnish  us 
with  the  separate  evidence  of  the  existence  of  each.  Or.  to  take 
another  illustration.  By  means  of  the  senses,  we  arrive  at  a 
knowledge  of  the  existence  of  sounds,  colors,  and  other  external 
objects  ;  and  we  are  certain  from  our  consciousness,  that  we  are 
possessed  of  intellectual  ideas  ;  and  no  reasonable  mind  demands 
more  than  the  separate  evidence  of  each  ;  no  man  requires  some 
mysterious  link  binding  them  together  to  be  pointed  out,  in  order 
to  believe  in  both.  Now,  we  are  not  required  to  act  on  a  different 
principle,  in  order  to  a  rational  belief,  both  in  the  moral  responsi- 
bility and  physical  dependence  of  man.  But  does  some  one  de- 


THE  CAUSAL  CONNECTION  OF  GOD  WITH  HIS  WORKS.      285 

clare  them  to  be  contradictory  ?  We  ask  him  for  his  proof.  He 
can  throw  the  onus  probandi  upon  us,  in  reference  to  the  two 
truths  advanced  by  us,  and  we  are  ready  to  furnish  him  with 
abundant  proofs.  But  if  he  bring  in  a  third  proposition  to  the 
effect  that  our  two  propositions  are  contradictory,  we  now  throw 
the  onus  probandi  upon  him  ;  and  his  proof  will  turn  out  to  be 
nothing  but  his  proposition  reasserted,  or  a  logomachy  in  which 
general  phrases  are  used  to  which  no  distinct  meaning  can  be 
attached,  or  used  in  one  sense,  to  establish  conclusions  which  can 
be  legitimately  drawn  from  them  only  when  used  in  a  totally  dif- 
ferent sense. 

Such  general  considerations  as  these  should  satisfy  the  mind, 
that  both  truths  may  be  established,  though  no  man  could  point 
out  the  link  connecting  them  ;  or  though  there  should  be  no  link 
uniting  them,  beyond  the  general  relation  of  all  things  to  one  an- 
other, in  the  Divine  mind  and  purpose.  Far  as  the  eye  can  reach, 
these  two  truths  are  seen  running  parallel  to  each  other.  Possibly 
there  may  be  no  point  in  which  they  coincide,  but  there  is  cer- 
tainly no  point  in  which  they  come  in  collision,  till  they  terminate 
in  the  supreme  source  of  all  power  and  all  .good.* 

But  let  us  plunge  a  little  into  the  thicket,  so  far  at  least  as  to 
discover  that  nothing  is  to  be  gained  by  penetrating  farther.  If 
the  mind  can  be  brought  to  philosophical  humility  in  no  other 
way,  let  it  be  by  its  being  driven  on  that  wall  of  adamant,  of 
which  Sir  James  Mackintosh  speaks.  "  The  wall  of  adamant, 
which  bounds  human  inquiry,  has  scarcely  ever  been  discovered 
by  any  adventurer,  until  he  has  been  roused  by  the  shock  which 
drove  him  back."t 

Let  us,  with  the  view  of  gaining  a  more  favorable  place  for  in- 
specting this  subject,  convey  ourselves  in  imagination  into  the 
position  of  the  Divine  Being,  when  resolving  to  create  substances 
different  from  himself.  Such  questions  as  these  would  require 

*  The  power  of  will,  and  the  universal  reign  of  causation,  we  hold  to  be  ultimate 
facts,  attested  by  primary  principles  in  our  constitution.  Necessarians  have  commonly 
denied  the  one,  and  Libertarians  the  other,  as  reaching  at  least  to  the  will.  We  main- 
tain both,  because  we  have  evidence  for  each.  As  being  ultimate  facts,  we  apprehend 
there  can  be  no  connection  discovered  between  them  by  us.  If  there  could  be  a 
connection  discovered  between  them,  this  would  show  that  they  were  not  ultimate  facts, 
but  that  they  met  in  a  farther  unity.  While  it  is  vain,  as  we  suspect,  to  seek  for  a 
connection,  it  is  assuredly  vain  to  seek  for  a  contradiction ;  and  above  all  things,  it  is 
absurd  to  represent  the  one  doctrine  as  setting  aside  the  other. 

f  Prel.  Diss.  Sect.  ii. 


286       RESPONSIBILITY    AND    FREEDOM    COMPATIBLE    WITH 

(humanly  speaking)  to  be  solved.  Is  God  to  form  only  such  crea 
tures  as  have  no  will  independent  of  his  will?  Are  all  creatures 
to  be  material,  or  simply  sentient  and  instinctive,  but  without 
reason  and  separate  moral  agency  ?  It  is  conceivable  that  in  some 
worlds,  or  in  our  own  world  at  an  earlier  stage  in  its  history,  all 
creation  is  or  was  of  this  lower  grade.  But  such  a  world,  it  is 
evident,  could  not  manifest  the  higher  attributes  of  the  Divine 
character.  Is  there  to  be  no  other  development  of  the  character 
of  God  ?  Could  not  God  create  a  being  in  his  own  image  in  this 
respect  among  others ;  that  he  had  freedom  of.  will  in  the  best 
sense  of  the  term,  as  implying  responsibility  ?  No  one  can  demon- 
strate that  God  could  not  create  such  a  being.  Such  a  creature, 
while  retaining  his  holy  character,  would  be  a  nobler  manifestation 
of  the  Divine  glory  than  mere  material  or  even  intellectual  exist- 
ence. In  creating  such  a  being,  God  would  reflect  some  of  his 
highest  perfections  ;  and  we  can  conceive  him  rejoicing  over  the 
act,  and  declaring  it  to  be  very  good  ;  and  all  intelligent  creation 
rejoicing  with  him,  over  the  formation  of  every  new  order  of  free 
moral  agents. 

"  How  would  it  now  look  to  you,"  says  the  philosophic  Saxon 
king,  Alfred,  "  if  there  were  any  very  powerful  king,  and  he  had 
no  freemen  in  all  his  kingdom,  but  that  all  were  slaves  ?  Then, 
said  I,  it  would  not  be  thought  by  me  right  nor  reasonable  if  men 
in  a  servile  condition  only  should  attend  upon  him.  Then,  quoth 
he,  it  would  be  more  unnatural  if  God,  in  all  his  kingdom,  had  no 
free  creature  under  his  power.  Therefore,  he  made  two  rational 
creatures,  free  angels  and  men,  and  gave  them  the  great  gift  of 
freedom.  Hence  they  could  do  evil  as  well  as  good,  whichever 
they  would.  He  gave  this  very  free  gift,  and  a  very  fixed  law  to 
every  man  unto  this  end." 

We  rejoice  to  recognize  such  a  being  in  man.  We  trust  that 
we  are  cherishing  no  presumptuous  feeling  when  we  believe  him 
to  be  free,  as  his  Maker  is  free.  We  believe  him,  morally  speak- 
ing, to  be  as  independent  of  external  control  as  his  Creator  must 
ever  be,  as  that  Creator  was  when  in  a  past  eternity  there  was  no 
external  existence  to  control  him. 

But  the  advocate  of  philosophical  necessity  interposes,  and  tells 
us  that  every  effect  has  a  cause,  and  that  every  disposition  and 
volition  of  the  intelligent  creature  must  have  an  antecedent  pro- 
ducing it.  We  at  once  agree  with  him.  We  are  led  by  an  intui- 
tion of  our  nature  to  a  belief  in  the  invariable  connection  between 


THE  CAUSAL  CONNECTION  OP  GOD  WITH    HIS  WORKS.       287 

cause  and  effect ;  and  we  see  numerous  proofs  of  this  law  of  cause 
and  effect  reigning  in  the  human  mind  as  it  does  in  the  external 
world,  and  reigning  in  the  will  as  it  does  in  every  other  depart- 
ment of  the  mind.  But  in  believing  the  whole  mental  world  to 
be  thus  regulated,  we  are  not  seeking  to  lower  or  degrade  it.  So 
far  from  the  law  of  cause  and  effect  being  a  restraint  on  the  free- 
dom of  intelligent  beings,  we  cannot  conceive  of  a  free  and  intel- 
ligent agent  except  under  the  operation  of  such  a  law.  We  can, 
indeed,  with  some  little  exercise  of  the  imagination,  picture  to  our- 
elves  a  being  in  whose  mental  operations  there  is  no  such  law, 
whose  thoughts  and  volitions  follow  each  other  at  random ;  but 
we  cannot  conceive  of  that  being  as  intelligent  or  responsible;  we 
are  constrained  to  conceive  of  him  as  utterly  helpless,  and  in  a 
more  lamentable  condition  than  the  raving  maniac. 

If  it  be  alleged  that  the  circumstance  that  volitions  have  a  cause 
renders  the  agent  no  longer  responsible  for  them,  we  forthwith 
demand  the  proof.  If  it  be  replied  that  the  conscience  says  so, 
then  we  meet  the  assertion  with  a  direct  contradiction.  The  con- 
science clearly  announces  the  responsibility  of  intelligent  and  vol- 
untary agents,  but  it  attaches  no  such  condition  to  responsibility. 
No  doubt  it  says,  that  if  actions  do  not  proceed  from  the  will,  but 
from  something  else,  from  mere  physical  or  external  restraint,  then 
the  agent  is  not  responsible  for  them.  But  if  the  deeds  proceed 
from  the  will,  then  it  at  once  attaches  a  responsibility  to  them. 
Place  before  the  mind  a  murder  committed  by  a  party  through 
pure  physical  compulsion  brought  to  bear  on  the  arm  that  inflicts 
the  blow,  and  the  conscience  says,  here  no  guilt  is  attachable. 
But  let  this  same  murder  be  done  with  the  thorough  consent  of 
the  will,  the  conscience  stops  not  to  inquire  whether  this  consent 
has  been  caused  or  no.  On  the  contrary,  it  immediately  declares 
the  action  to  be  highly  criminal.  Should  it  be  proven  that  this 
act  of  the  will  has  proceeded  from  an  utterly  malignant  state  of 
the  will  going  before,  so  far  from  withdrawing  its  former  sentence, 
the  conscience  pronounces  a  farther  condemnation  upon  the  prior 
exhibition  of  the  will  now  brought  under  its  notice.  The  admira- 
tion which  the  moral  faculty  leads  us  to  entertain  of  any  of  the 
holy  acts  of  God's  will  is  not  lessened  but  increased,  when  we  learn 
that  they  proceed  from  a  will  essentially  holy  ;  and  the  reason  is, 
because  now  we  admire,  not  merely  the  single  acts  brought  under 
our  notice,  but  all  the  other  exhibitions  of  that  holy  will  that  rise 
before  our  mind.  Nor  when  we  descend  from  heaven  to  earth, 


288       RESPONSIBILITY    AND    FREEDOM  COMPATIBLE   WITH 

and  from  God  to  man,  do  we  find  the  conscience  excusing  any 
given  criminal  action  of  the  human  family,  when  it  is  discovered 
that  it  proceeds  from  a  heart  utterly  depraved.  On  the  contrary, 
we  find  the  conscience  now  going  forth  upon  this  farther  fact 
brought  under  its  notice,  and  pronouncing  a  heavier  condemnation 
upon  it  than  even  upon  the  other. 

In  holding  by  these  great  truths,  we  would  cut  a  clear  way 
through  this  perplexing  subject,  and  thus  cast  off  on  either  side 
difficulties  which  it  would  require  a  volume  to  discuss  in  detail. 
Our  limits  admit  of  our  considering  only  one  objection  ; — that  de- 
rived from  the  law  of  cause  and  effect,  being  in  the  human  mind 
a  divinely  appointed  law. 

The  discovery  of  this  very  obvious  circumstance  has  led  hasty 
and  superficial  thinkers  to  draw  very  erroneous  conclusions.  They 
feel  as  if  they  were  driven  to  one  or  other  of  two  horns  of  the 
dilemma ; — to  suppose,  with  Lord  Kames,  that  man  cannot  prop- 
erly be  responsible,  or  when  conscience  opposes  this  manifest  heresy 
against  our  nature,  to  draw  back,  and  maintain  that  the  law  of 
cause  and  effect  has,  and  can  have,  no  place  in  the  human  mind. 
We  take  neither  alternative.  We  are  shut  up  by  observation,  and 
the  primary  laws  of  our  intellecual  being,  to  believe  that  the  law 
of  causality  prevails  among  the  voluntary  acts  of  mankind,  as  it 
does  everywhere  else  ;  but  we  deny  that  this  law  interferes  with 
our  moral  responsibility,  and  if  the  law  itself  does  not  free  us  from 
moral  obligations,  it  is  clear  that  the  circumstance  that  God  hath 
appointed  it  cannot  be  regarded  as  interfering  with  our  accounta- 
bility. Suppose  that  this  law  had  not  been  appointed  by  God — 
suppose  that  man  had  been  a  self-existent  underived  being  like 
God,  the  existence  of  such  a  law  could  not  have  prevented  us  from 
becoming  moral  agents  ;  and  every  one  must  see  that  if  the  mere 
law  itself  could  not  do  this,  the  Divine  connection  with  the  law 
can  have  no  such  effect. 

But  this  circumstance  is  fitted  to  show  how  it  is  that  the  crea- 
ture can  be  dependent  and  yet  free.  He  is  rendered  dependent  by 
a  divinely  appointed  law  ;  but  that  law,  so  far  as  it  touches  on 
moral  agency,  differs  in  no  way  from  the  same  law  in  a  self-exist- 
ent mind.  We  thus  see  ourselves  to  be  at  once  under  physical 
and  moral  law,  to  be  equally  under  the  Divine  government,  phy- 
sically and  morally.  We  are  under  the  one  through  our  physical 
nature,  through  the  divinely  appointed  law  of  cause  and  effect,  and 
we  are  under  the  other  through  our  moral  and  responsible  nature. 


THE    CAUSAL  CONNECTION  OP  GOD  WITH  HIS  WORKS.       28$ 

The  man  who  would  deny  the  former  of  these  truths,  must  be 
prepared  to  hold  that  the  human  mind  is  not  under  the  influence 
of  law  of  any  kind,  and  that  all  attempts  to  classify  its  powers,  or 
calculate  upon  its  voluntary  operations,  must  be  utterly  vain  ;  and 
that  we  cannot  from  the  past  anticipate  what  any  man's  conduct 
may  be  in  time  to  come.  This  man  sets  himself  against  both  the 
intuitions  and  the  observations  of  the  understanding.  The  person 
who  denies  the  latter  of  these  truths  sets  himself  against  the  clear- 
est enunciations  of  the  conscience.  Some  would  charge  us  with 
believing  contradictory  propositions,  in  holding  by  both  ;  but  we 
could,  with  greater  justice,  charge  that  man  with  contradicting  one 
or  other  of  two  fundamental  principles  of  our  nature,  who  would 
deny  either.  We  are  not  at  liberty  to  take  our  choice  between 
them  ;  for  in  rejecting  the  one  or  other,  we  are  rejecting  an  essen- 
tial part  of  our  very  nature,  and  we  therefore  cleave  to  both  as 
truths  which  meet  in  our  own  as  they  meet  in  the  Divine  mind. 

But  a  difficulty  is  pressed  upon  us. — Is  not  God  to  blame  for  the 
creature's  guilt  through  his  connection  with  this  law?  Now,  in 
reference  to  this  difficulty  we  remark,  first,  that  though  God  was 
to  blame  we  would  not  therefore  be  freed  from  responsibility. 
When  one  man  leads  another  into  sin,  the  sin  of  the  latter  being 
committed  willingly,  he  cannot  free  himself  from  the  guilt.  Even 
on  the  supposition  that  the  creature  could  make  his  Creator  share 
his  guilt,  he  would  not  therefore  be  free  from  blame  on  falling  into 
sin.  We  are  aware  that  the  supposition  now  put  is  revolting  to 
every  well-constituted  mind  ;  but  it  may  serve  a  good  purpose  to 
put  it,  as  it  shows  how,  even  if  the  sinner  could  lay  the  guilt  on 
his  Maker,  he  would  not  therefore  free  himself  from  blame. 

But  in  answer  to  the  question,  we  remark,  secondly,  that  as  this 
law  does  not  interfere  with  the  liberty  of  the  agent,  so  God's  con- 
nection with  that  law  cannot  involve  him  in  that  agent's  sin  as 
long  as  that  agent  is  left  in  possession  of  this  his  essential  liberty. 
If  it  can  be  demonstrated  on  other  grounds,  as  all  admit,  that 
God  utterly  abhors  that  which  is  morally  evil,  the  mere  circum- 
stance that  he  hath  so  constituted  man,  that  his  mind  is  regulated 
by  cause  and  effect,  cannot  implicate  him  in  man's  guilt,  as  long 
as  he  hath  left  him  free  to  follow  his  own  will. 

But  it  is  time  that  we  were  escaping  from  these  thorny  brakes. 
It  was  with  considerable  reluctance  that  we  entered  upon  the  sub- 
ject of  the  causal  connection  of  Deity  with  the  moral  actions  of 
his  intelligent  and  responsible  creatures.  Still,  as  the  topic  came 

19 


290      RESPONSIBILITY    AND    FREEDOM    COMPATIBLE    WITH 

in  our  way,  it  might  have  seemed  cowardice  to  flee  from  it ;  and 
it  was  needful,  besides,  to  consider  it,  in  order  to  rectify  the  false 
notions  that  lie  on  either  side.  We  tremble  equally  at  the  idea 
of  removing1  the  creature  from  under  the  control  of  God,  and  of 
making  him  so  dependent  on  God  as  to  involve  God  in  the  respon- 
sibility of  his  acts. 

"  When  reason,"  says  JoufTroy,  "  fails  of  success  it  may  master 
the  difficulty  which  has  veiled  the  subject,  by  separating  with  care, 
in  the  question,  that  which  is  known  from  that  which   is  not 
known  ;  by  determining  with  precision,  the  nature  of  this  difficulty, 
send  the  circumstances,  the  extent,  and   the  causes  in  detail ;  by 
exploring,  in  a  word,  the  rock  which  it  cannot  break,  and  if  it  does 
not  leave  the  problem  resolved,  it  at  least  renders  to  science  the 
office  of  correctly  weighing  it.     These  mere  negative  researches 
often  conduct  to  a  still  more  important  result.     In  fathoming  the 
nature  of  a  difficulty  which  it  cannot  surmount,  it  may  happen 
that  science  discovers  that  this  difficulty  is  insurmountable  in  itself. 
Then  it  is  no  longer  the  limit  of  the  power  of  the  individual  that 
is  met  with  and  ascertained;  it  is  that  of  the  power  of  human 
reason  itself.     This  result  is  not  less  important  than  the  discovery 
of  the  truth  itself.     There  are  two  alternatives  to  the  man  who 
thinks  to  have  his  spirit  calmed.     The  first  is  to  possess,  or  think 
that  he  possesses,  the  truth  on  the  questions  which  interest  hu- 
manity ;  and  the  second  is  to  know  clearly  that  this  truth  is  inac- 
cessible, and  to  know  why  it  is  so.     We  never  see  humanity  re- 
belling against  the  barriers  which  limit  its  power  on  all   hands."* 
Now,  it  is  to  this  issue  that  we  have  sought  to  bring  the  question 
of  man's  free  and  moral  agency.     For  ourselves,   we  may  think 
that  we  possess  the  truth.     Should  there  be  persons  who  have  not 
arrived  at  so  satisfying  a  conclusion,  we  are  convinced   that  the 
considerations  urged  above,  if  sufficiently  pondered,  will  at  least 
conduct  them  to  the  alternative  conclusion  that  the  difficulty  is 
insurmountable.     High  truths,  like  high  mountains,  are  apt  to 
veil  themselves  in  clouds.     Nevertheless,  it  is  from  the  summit  of 
these  high  truths,  if  we  could  but  reach  it,  that  we  see  the  nature 
and  bearing  of  all  connected  truth,  as  from  the  top  of  some  high 
mountain,  the  axis  of  its  range,  we  discover  the  shape  and  size  of 
all  the  adjacent  hills.     We  may  be  deceived  in  thinking   that  in 
these  speculations  we  have  reached  such  a  summit,  or  we  may 
only  have  got  into  a  region  of  perpetual  clouds.     In  either  case, 
*  Morale  en  Melanges. 


THE  CAUSAL  CONNECTION  OF  GOD  WITH  HIS  WORKS.      291 

the  mind  should  feel  that  it  has  reached  a  limit  which  it  cannot 
pass  ;  and  instead  of  beating  uselessly  against  the  barrier,  it  should 
return  to  explore  the  vast  and  fruitful  region  within  its  reach. 

ILLUSTRATIVE  NOTE  (E.)— PRINCIPLE  OF  CAUSE  AND  EFFECT  IN  THE 

HUMAN  MIND. 

We  have  endeavored  to  point  out  the  way  in  which  the  prin- 
ciple of  cause  and  effect  operates  in  the  material  universe :  it  is 
by  the  action  of  corporeal  substances  upon  each  other  according 
to  their  properties,*  A  material  substance  is  in  itself  passive. 
Apart  from  something  external  to  itself,  it  will  never  change. 
Putrefaction,  and  certain  similar  processes,  may  seem  an  excep- 
tion, but  they  are  so  only  in  appearance ;  for  in  all  such  cases,  it 
is  acknowledged  that  the  separate  elements  of  which  the  body  is 
composed  act  upon  each  other. 

It  seems  to  be  a  characteristic  of  matter  that  all  its  operations 
proceed  from  the  action  of  one  substance  upon  another.  Hence 
it  is  in  its  very  nature  passive  and  dependent. 

Herein  is  the  activity  and  the  independence  of  spirit  distin- 
guished from  the  passiveness  and  dependence  of  matter.  We 
hold — we  cannot  but  hold — that  the  principle  of  cause  and  effect 
reigns  in  mind  as  in  matter.  Our  intuitive  belief  in  causation 
leads  us  to  this  conclusion.  It  is  on  account  of  the  existence  of 
such  a  connection  that  we  can  anticipate  the  future  in  regard  to 
the  actions  of  intelligent  and  voluntary  beings,  as  well  as  in  re- 
gard to  changes  in  material  substances.  It  is  upon  it  that  we 
ground  our  confidence  in  the  character  and  word  of  God.  But 
there  is  an  important  difference  between  the  manner  in  which  this 
principle  operates  in  body  and  in  spirit.  In  all  proper  mental 
operations  the  causes  and  the  effects  lie  both  within  the  mind. 
Mind  is  a  self-acting  substance,  and  hence  its  activity  and  inde- 
pendence. 

We  acknowledge  that  things,  ab  extra,  do  operate  upon  the 
human  mind.  In  respect,  for  instance,  to  the  sensations  produced 
by  sensible  objects,  the  mind  is  passive,  though  even  here  the  ex- 
istence of  the  sensation  implies  a  mental  capacity  belonging  to 
the  mind  itself.t  But  in  respect  of  its  proper  functions,  the  mind 

*  See  ante,  p.  92. 

f  Hence  in  all  action  of  body  on  mind,  and  of  mind  on  body,  in  all  perception,  for 
instance,  and  muscular  movement,  there  is  a  double  cause.  There  is  body  and  mind 
in  one  state  followed  by  the  body  and  mind  in  another  state.  This  principle  followed 


292  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

is  self-acting.*  Changes  are  produced  within  the  mind  by  the 
mind  itself.  These  changes  are  produced  according  to  mental  laws, 
and  these  laws  are  the  faculties  or  the  attributes  of  the  agent. 

It  is  only  when  we  take  this  view,  and  combine  it  with  that 
previously  given,  in  regard  to  the  relation  between  cause  and  ef- 
fect, that  we  are  enabled  to  construct  an  argument  in  behalf  of 
the  existence  of  God  free  from  objection.  All  causes  we  have 
seen  reside  in  a  substance.  Now,  human  inquiries,  if  carried  suf- 
ficiently far,  conduct  to  a  great  first  cause.  This  cause,  we  sup- 
pose, resides  in  the  very  nature. of  God,  whose  power  is  in  himself 
from  all  eternity,  the  Jehovah,  the  great  I  AM.  We  thus  arrive 
at  eternal  self-operating  causes  in  the  Divine  mind ;  and  are 
saved  from  the  contradiction  with  which  the  atheist  taunts  us,  of 
arriving,  by  means  of  a  succession  of  causes,  at  that  which  has 
no  cause. 

We  have  said  that  changes  are  produced  in  the  mind  by  means 
of  the  faculties  of  the  mind.  In  investigating  the  operations  of 
the  human  mind,  the  difference  between  their  mode  of  action, 
and  that  of  material  substances,  has  not  always  been  kept  in 
view.  Hence,  in  particular,  the  error  that  pervades  the  system 
of  Dr.  Thomas  Brown,  who  speaks  of  all  our  ideas  as  mental 
states,  produced  by  the  immediately  preceding  state,  according  to 
the  laws  of  simple  and  relative  suggestions,  without  taking  into 
account  the  active  and  abiding  faculties  of  the  soul,  which  (and 
not  the  mere  contiguous  state)  are  the  main  causes  of  any  given 
mental  state.  We  say  the  main  causes,  or  rather  the  main  ele- 
ment in  any  given  cause  ;  for  in  mind  as  in  matter,  causes  have 
always  somewhat  of  complexity.  It  is  the  same  quality  or  power 
exercised  in  the  same  circumstances. 

We  have  seen  formerly  that  in  the  operation  of  cause  in  the 
material  universe,  there  must  be  the  presence  of  two  or  more 
bodies.  We  have  now  said  that,  in  this  respect,  mind  differs  es- 
sentially from  matter.  But  still  there  is  so  far  an  analogy  between 
the  operation  of  causes  in  both.  In  mental,  as  in  material  phe- 
nomena, there  is  a  certain  complexity  in  the  causes.  The  whole 
cause  of  any  given  mental  state,  is  not  as  Dr.  Brown  constantly 

out  may  throw  some  light  both  on  the  philosophy  of  perception  and  of  voluntary 
motion. 

*  "  Every  body  which  is  moved  from  without  is  soulless ;  but  that  which  is  moved 
from  within  of  itself  possesses  a  soul — such,  then,  is  the  very  nature  of  soul" — 
(Plato's  Phsedrus.) 


CAUSE    AND    EFFECT    IN    THE    HUMAN    MIND.  293 

assumes,  the  immediately  preceding  state.  When  we  feel  our 
persons  to  be  in  danger,  and  resolve  on  adopting  steps  to  avoid 
the  peril,  it  is  not  the  mere  perception  of  the  danger  that  is  the 
cause  of  the  succeeding  volition.  There  is  most  assuredly  in  the 
cause,  not  only  the  sense  of  the  danger,  but,  as  a  more  important 
element,  the  power  of  will.  When  on  hearing  a  falsehood  told, 
we  feel  a  strong  moral  indignation  ;  there  is  something  more  in 
the  cause  of  this  indignation  than  a  mere  conception  of  the  false- 
hood ;  there  is  a  faculty  of  the  mind,  which  leads  us  to  abhor  that 
which  is  evil  In  short,  the  true  cause  of  any  given  mental  phe- 
nomenon, its  invariable  antecedent,  which  will  always  produce  it, 
and  without  which  it  cannot  recur,  is.  composed  of  two  things — 
the  immediately  preceding  state,  and  a  mental  power  or  faculty. 
Should  the  latter  be  held  as  truly  the  cause,  then  the  other  falls 
to  be  regarded  as  the  circumstances,  in  the  common  aphorism, 
that  the  same  cause  produces  the  same  effect  in  the  same  circum- 
stances. In  many  cases,  the  cause  is  still  more  complex,  and 
embraces  other  elements  ;  as,  for  instance,  the  previous  habits 
of  the  soul — nay,  the  very  casual  associations  of  the  mind  in  all 
its  previous  history,  and  the  forgotten  incidents  of  childhood,  may 
be  swaying  more  or  less  powerfully  the  actual  state  produced  at 
any  given  moment. 

The  non-observance  of  these  important  distinctions  has  led  to 
much  confusion  in  the  controversy  between  Libertarians  and 
.Necessarians. 

Pseudo-necessarians,  perverting  the  proper  doctrine  of  philo- 
sophical necessity,  have  represented  man  as  having  all  his 
thoughts  and  feelings  determined  by  an  external  cause,  and  thus 
as  the  mere  creature  of  circumstances. 

Libertarians  in  opposing  the  doctrine,  have  commonly  argued  as 
if  all  Necessarians  held  the  doctrine  as  now  stated. 

Nor  have  Necessarians,  even  of  the  highest  order,  been  suffi- 
ciently careful  to  guard  the  language  employed  by  them.  Afraid 
of  making  admissions  to  their  opponents,  we  believe  that  none  of 
them  have  fully  developed  the  phenomena  of  human  spontaneity. 
Even  Edwards  ridicules  the  idea  of  the  faculty  or  power  of  will, 
or  the  soul  in  the  use  of  that  power  determining  its  own  voli- 
tions.* Now,  we  hold  it  to  be  an  incontrovertible  fact,  and  one 
of  great  importance,  that  the  true  determining  cause  of  every 
given  volition  is  not  any  mere  anterior  incitement,  but  the  very 
*  See  throughout  Section  il  of  Part  IL 


DISTINCTIONS    TO   BE    ATTENDED    TO 

soul  itselfj-by  its  inherent  power  of  will.  That  man  has  not  scan- 
ned the  full  phenomena  which  consciousness  discloses,  who  de- 
nies the  real  potency  of  will — a  potency  above  all  special  volitions, 
and  the  true  power  exercised  in  producing  these  volitions. 

True  Necessarians  should  learn  in  what  way  to  hold  and  de- 
fend their  doctrine.  Let  them  disencumber  themselves  of  all  that 
doubtful  argument,  derived  from  man  being  supposed  to  be  swayed 
by  the  most  powerful  motive.  We  must  ever  hold  that  a  mere 
incitement  can  become  a  motive,  only  so  far  as  sanctioned  by  the 
will ;  so  that  it  is  not  so  much  the  motive  that  determines  the 
will,  as  the  will  that  gives  strength  to  the  motive.  Let  Necessa- 
rians found  their  doctrine  on  the  circumstance,  that  the  principle 
of  cause  and  effect  reigns  in  the  domains  of  mind  as  in  the  terri- 
tories of  matter.  Let  them  also  be  careful  to  show  that  this  prin- 
ciple, as  a  mental  principle,  works  ab  intra.  In  proceeding  in  this 
manner,  they  may  found  their  doctrine  on  one  of  the  very  intel- 
lectual intuitions  of  man's  mind  which  leads  us  in  mental  as  in 
material  phenomena,  to  anticipate  the  same  effects  to  follow  the 
same  causes.  Their  defence,  too,  might  not  be  injured,  but  rather 
strengthened  by  their  dropping  the  word  necessity,  as  ambiguous 
to  say  the  least  of  ix,  and  as  unhappily  associated  with  the  idea 
of  a  restraint  laid  on  the  will,  such  as  mere  causation  does  not 
and  cannot  lay  upon  what  we  regard  as  its  inherent  and  essential 
freedom. 


SECTION  III— DISTINCTIONS   TO  BE  ATTENDED  TO  IN  ETHICAL 

INQUIRY. 

In  entering  upon  ethical  inquiry,  we  are  met  at  the  very  thresh- 
old by  the  important  question. — Is  there  a  real  distinction  between 
virtue  and  vice  ?  This  is  a  question  to  which  the  mind  sincerely 
inquiring  after  truth  may  find  an  immediate  and  direct  answer ; 
and  this  independently  of  all  those  subtle  investigations  into 
which  certain  other  ethical  inquiries  conduct  us.  The  human 
soul,  by  the  very  principles  of  its  constitution,  indicates  that  there 
is  an  indelible  distinction  between  virtue  and  vice,  even  as  there 
is  an  indelible  distinction  between  truth  and  error.  Every  in- 
quirer has  a  ready  method  of  settling  this  point.  Let  him  sub- 
mit to  his  mind  such  voluntary  acts  as  the  following,  and  attend 
to  the  decision  which  the  mind  pronounces.  Two  persons,  simi- 
larly situated,  receive  each  a  signal  favor,  from  a  disinterested  and 


IN    ETHICAL    INQUIRY.  295 

self-sacrificing  benefactor.  The  one  cherishes  gratitude  all  his 
life,  and  the  other  speedily  forgets  that  he  is  under  any  obligation 
to  the  individual  who  has  thus  befriended  him.  When  these  two 
acts  are  submitted  to  the  mind,  it  pronounces  its  decisions  instantly 
and  authoritatively ;  and  the  one  decision  is  expressed  in  the  lan- 
guage— "  this  is  right,"  and  in  the  other  in  the  words  "  this  is 
wrong."  Let  metaphysicians  dispute  as  they  may,  moralists  may 
say,  about  the  faculties  or  feelings  exercised  when  the  mind  pro- 
nounces such  judgments,  there  is  no  doubt  that  the  mind  does 
pronounce  such  sentences,  and  cannot  be  made  to  pronounce  any 
other.  Should  any  one  insist  on  our  producing  a  reason  for  these 
judgments,  we  reckon  it  sufficient  to  reply,  that  they  are  primi- 
tive judgments  pronounced  by  the  rnind  on  the  case  being  submit- 
ted to  it,  and  that  we  cannot  produce  a  reason  for  the  judgment 
which  the  mind  pronounces  in  this  case,  any  more  than  for  that 
judgment  to  which  it  comes,  when,  on  contemplating  first  sounds, 
and  then  colors,  it  proclaims  them  to  be  different. 

But  other  questions  press  themselves  upon  us,  and  demand  an 
answer ;  and  it  is  of  vast  moment  that  we  be  able  to  separate  the 
questions  which  have  got  confounded  together  in  ethical  investi- 
gation. The  later  writers  on  this  subject  in  our  country  appear 
to  us  not  to  have  been  sufficiently  careful  in  distinguishing  the 
things  that  differ,  and  have  at  times  lost  themselves  in  the  laby- 
rinth produced  by  their  not  laying  out  in  the  fabric  which  they 
have  built  a  few  leading  passages,  into  which  all  the  others 
might  run. 

Besides  the  general  question  above  referred  to,  there  are  in  re- 
ality four  subjects  contained  in  the  one  grand  subject,  and  the 
greatest  confusion  of  idea,  and,  in  some  cases,  positive  error,  has 
arisen  from  not  systematically  noticing  the  distinction  between 
them. 

There  is  FIRST,  the  determination  of  the  mental  process,  the 
faculty  or  feeling  by  which  the  distinction  between  vice  and  virtue 
is  observed. 

There  is,  SECONDLY,  the  common  quality  or  qualities  to  be 
found  in  all  virtuous  action. 

There  is,  THIRDLY,  the  rule  by  which  we  are  to  determine 
whether  an  action  is  virtuous. 

There  are,  FOURTHLY,  the  consequences  which  follow  from 
virtue  arid  vice  in  the  feelings  of  the  mind  and  the  experience 
of  society. 


296  DISTINCTIONS    TO    BE    ATTENDED  TO 

The  elder  ethical  writers,  whether  of  ancient  Greece  and  Rome 
or  modern  Europe,  treated  very  much  of  what  we  have  called  the 
general  question,  and  of  what  we  have  arranged  as  the  fourth  of 
the  specific  inquiries.  They  have  shown  that  there  is  an  indelible 
distinction  between  good  and  evil,  and  their  most  eloquent  pas- 
sages have  been  those  in  which  they  have  pointed  out  the  conse- 
quences which  usually  follow  good  and  evil.  Their  grand  aim 
was  to  establish  both  of  these  truths,  and,  having  done  so,  they 
thought  they  had  secured  a  deep  foundation  for  morality.  No 
doubt  some  of  them  resolved  the  one  into  the  other — the  Epicu- 
reans resolving  all  virtue  into  a  refined  love  of  happiness,  and  the 
Stoics  speaking  slightingly  of  happiness  except  in  its  relation  to 
virtue.  Still  all  the  higher  order  of  moralists  sought  to  establish 
both  truths.  Some  have  maintained  that  we  should  be  on  our 
guard  against  looking  to  anything  but  the  personal  charms  of 
virtue,  and  others,  afraid  that  these  might  not  be  sufficient  to  fix 
our  regards,  have  been  fond  of  magnifying  her  patrimony ;  but  all 
agree  that  she  is  to  be  sought  after  for  what  she  is  in  herself,  or 
what  she  brings  with  her. 

The  other  questions  are  also  of  great  moment,  and  an  answer 
is  demanded  to  them  by  the  precision  expected  in  modern 


investigation. 


The  FIRST,  or  the  determination  of  the  mental  process,  must 
no  doubt  be  of  a  psychological,  as  well  as  an  ethical  character ; 
but  it  is  to  be  remembered  that  a  perverted  metaphysics  has  often 
led  to  very  dangerous  theological  and  ethical  errors,  and  the  most 
effective  remedy  is  a  correct  representation  of  the  mental  proces- 
ses which  have  been  misrepresented.  The  inquiry  into  the  nature 
of  the  faculty  which  draws  the  distinction  between  good  and  evil 
will  be  found,  besides,  to  give  us  clearer  views  of  the  nature  of 
the  distinction  itself,  and  will  assist  us  in  other  investigations  in 
regard  to  the  present  moral  state  of  the  human  race: 

It  is  of  the  utmost  moment,  as  we  shall  see  in  the  sequel,  that 
the  SECOND  QUESTION  as  to  the  nature  of  the  distinction  between 
virtue  and  vice  considered  in  themselves,  should  be  kept  distinct 
from  the  first,  or  the  inquiry  into  the  nature  of  the  moral  faculty. 
The  virtue  of  an  agent  does  not  consist  in  the  possession  of  the 
moral  faculty  or  feeling,  but  in  the  possession  of  the  qualities  at 
which  the  moral  faculty  or  feeling  looks,  and  of  which  it  approves. 
We  cannot  be  too  frequently  reminded  that  the  possession  of  con- 
science and  the  possession  of  virtue  are  two  different  things.  Con- 


IN    ETHICAL    INQUIRY.  297 

science  is  the  law,  faculty,  or  feeling  which  contemplates  the 
voluntary  acts  of  responsible  beings,  and  proclaims  them  to  be 
virtuous  or  vicious  ;  whereas  virtue  is  the  quality  or  the  qualities 
in  these  acts  which  calls  forth  the  approbation  of  the  conscience. 
Conscience  is  the  judge,  and  virtuous  and  vicious  actions  are  the 
parties  judged,  the  one  being  approved  and  the  other  condemned. 
It  appears,  then,  that  after  we  have  settled  the  first  question,  there 
remains  the  second  to  be  settled,  and  this  second  scarcely,  if  at  all, 
inferior  in  importance  to  the  other. 

The  THIRD  inquiry,  or  into  the  rule,  is  eminently  the  practical 
one.  It  falls  to  be  alluded  to  in  this  treatise  merely  that  we  may 
distinguish  it  from  the  others,  and  conversely  point  out  its  relation 
to  them.  The  answer  to  the  question  will  be  found  in  the  innu- 
merable practical  treatises  on  the  duty  of  man. 

In  regard  to  the  FOURTH  question,  or  the  inquiry  into  the  conse- 
quences that  follow  virtue  and  vice,  it  is  of  importance  to  separate 
it  from  all  the  others.  It  is  indeed  of  vast  moment  to  be  able  to 
distinguish  between  the  qualities  which,  being  in  an  action,  render 
it  virtuous,  and  the  qualities  of  the  effects  that  flow  from.it.  The 
former  of  these  is  a  property  of  the  agent,  but  the  latter  is  a  prop- 
erty, not  so  much  of  the  agent,  as  of  the  Divine  government. 


SECTION.  IV.— INQUIRY  INTO  THE  NATURE  OF  CONSCIENCE,  OR  THE 
MENTAL  FACULTY  OR  FEELING  WHICH  DRAWS  THE  DISTINCTION 
BETWEEN  RIGHT  AND  WRONG. 

We  now  take  up  the  first  of  the  four  special  topics  which  fall  to 
be  discussed  in  treating  of  God's  moral  government,  or,  in  other 
words,  we  go  on  to  inquire  what  is  the  mental  state  or  process  by 
which  the  distinction  between  good  and  evil  is  discovered  and 
manifested. 

Let  us  begin  with  taking  a  passing  survey  of  the  mode  of  the 
operation  of  the  human  mind  when  different  classes  of  objects  are 
presented  before  it.  Let  us  first  view  it  as  acting  when  a  propo*- 
sition  of  a  purely  intellectual  character  is  submitted  t6  it, — any  of 
the  propositions,  for  instance,  of  geometry. 

On  any  of  these  propositions  being  brought  under  its  notice,  it 
pronounces  a  decision  regarding  it,  and  the  language  in  which  we 
express  the  decision  is,  "it  is  true,"  or,  "it  is  false."  Now,  in 
pronouncing  this  decision,  the  mind  proceeds  on  its  own  laws  or 
principles — principles  which  are  fundamental,  and  as  incapable  of 


298  INQUIRY    INTO    THE    NATURE    OF    CONSCIENCE. 

analysis  as  the  simple  elements  to  which  chemistry  at  last  con- 
ducts us  in  the  analysis  of  corporeal  substances. 

"  Considering  this,"  says  Aristotle,  "  that  the  beginning"  of  dem- 
onstration cannot  be  demonstration,  nor  the  beginning  of  science, 
science;  and  since  we  have  said  there  is  no  other  kind  of  truth, 
intuition  must  be  the  beginning  of  science."  All  reasoning,  then, 
it  is  acknowledged,  carries  us  back  to  certain  intuitive  principles. 
In  saying  so,  we  mean  that  in  the  analysis  of  it  we  are  conducted 
at  last  to  truths  which  admit  of  no  demonstration.  Properly 
speaking,  reasoning  does  not  .carry  us  back  to  these  axiomatic 
.  truths — it  proceeds  upon  them.  It  cannot  eveti  be  said  to  begin 
with  them  ;  for,  till  reason  begins,  these  axioms  have  no  existence 
in  the  mind.  Nay,  these  principles  have  at  no  time  a  separate 
existence  as  notions  in  the  mind,  at  least  till  it  begins  to  form  reflex 
metaphysical  abstractions.  The  conception  of  them,  is  one  of  the 
most  refined  and  difficult  exercises  in  which  the  mind  can  engage, 
and  the  correct  expression  of  them  is  one  of  the  most  arduous 
works  about  which  human  language  can  be  employed.  The 
reason  proceeds  on  these  axiomatic  principles,  just  as  the  eye 
sees  by  means  of  rays  of  light,  and  neither  takes  cognizance  of 
those  media  which  are  needful  for  its  exercise.  It  is  by  a  reflex 
act  of  the  mind,  and  that  a  very  subtle  one,  that  the  philosopher 
is  led  to  discover  what  is  the  nature  of  the  fundamental  principles 
imposed  upon,  or  rather  forming  part  of  the  very  faculties  of  the 
human  mind.  They  are  roots  or  radicals  supporting  all  visible 
truth,  but  themselves  unseen,  and  only  to  be  discovered  by  arti- 
ficially digging  into  the  depths  which  they  penetrate,  and  which 
cover  them  from  the  view. 

All  modern  philosophers  of  authority  have  acknowledged  that 
there  are  such  fundamental  principles.  Kant  speaks  of  them  as 
the  categories  of  the  understanding,  and  the  ideas  of  pure  reason. 
Reid  calls  them  the  principles  of  the  com/munis  sensus,  very  un- 
happily translated  by  a  name  usually  differently  applied — com- 
mon sense.  Stewart  calls  them  the  "  laws  of  human  thought,  or 
belief."  '  Brown  speaks  of  them  as  the  primary  universal  intuitions 
of  direct  belief.  Cousin  talks  of  them  as  simple  mental  appercep- 
tions and  primitive  judgments.  Mackintosh,  in  referring  to  them, 
says, — "  They  seem  to  be  accurately  described  as  notions  which 
cannot  be  conceived  separately,  but  without  which  nothing  can 
be  conceived.  They  are  not  only  necessary  to  reasoning  and  be- 
lief, but  to  thought  itself."  Mackintosh  elsewhere  represents  them 


INQUIRY    INTO    THE    NATURE    OF    CONSCIENCE.  299 

as  "  the  indispensable  conditions  of  thought  itself."  It  is  to  them, 
as  we  apprehend,  that  Whewell  refers  under  the  phrase  "  funda- 
mental ideas,"  so  often  employed  by  him.  Sir  William  Hamilton 
has  completed  all  past  metaphysics  on  this  subject,  by  showing 
that  the  argument,  from  the  principles  of  common  sense,  is  one 
strictly  philosophic  and  scientific,  and  by  a  critical  review  of  the 
nomenclature,  all  proceeding  on  the  same  principle  which  has  been 
employed  by  upwards  of  one  hundred  of  the  profoundest  thinkers 
in  ancient  and  modern  times.*  It  is  very  interesting  to  observe 
how  deep  and  earnest  thinkers  come  at  last  to  a  wonderful  agree- 
ment, even  when  they  appear  to  superficial  observers  to  have  no 
one  principle  in  common. 

But  while  all  philosophers,  ancient  and  modern,  (with  the  ex- 
ception of  those  who  wished  to  produce  a  universal  scepticism,) 
agree  in  regarding  certain  principles  as  pre-supposed  when  the 
mind  is  employed  intellectually,  it  has  not  been  so  frequently  ob- 
served that  there  are  similar  principles  implied  in  the  exercise  of 
the  mind  when  it  is  contemplating  the  voluntary  acts  of  responsi- 
ble agents.  When  these  voluntary  acts  pass  in  review  before  the 
mind,  it  declares  regarding  them  that  "  they  are  good,"  or  that 
"  they  are  bad,"  and  it  does  so  according  to  a  principle  which  can- 
not be  resolved  into  anything  more  simple.  Let  a  deed  of  cruelty 
and  injustice  be  presented,  and  no  one  denies  that  the  mind  in- 
stantly indicates  its  abhorrence  of  it ;  and  what  we  now  affirm  is, 
that  it  does  so  according  to  a  fundamental  principle  of  the  human 
mind. 

In  asserting  that  there  is  such  a  fundamental  principle,  we  are 
not  assuming  anything  anomalous  ;  for  it  is  universally  acknowl- 
edged that  there  are  such  principles  regulating  the  mind  when 
intellectually  employed.  Present  two  sensations  produced  by  ex- 
ternal objects  to  the  mind,  and  it  perceives  a  resemblance  or  a  dif- 
ference between  them,  and  it  does  so  according  to  a  law  of  our 
nature.  Present  the  voluntary  acts  of  an  accountable  being  to 
the  mind,  and  it  decides  regarding  them  that  they  are  right  or  that 
they  are  wrong.  We  believe  the  one  act  of  the  mind  to  be  as 
simple  and  unresolvable  as  the  other. 

Should  any  party  insist  on  our  resolving  this  intuitive  principle, 

we  remind  him   that  in  doing  so  we  would  only  be  resolving  it 

back  into  a  farther  principle,  and  that  he  might,  on  the  same 

ground,  ask  us  to  resolve  that   principle  also,  and,  as  he  thus 

*  See  Dissertations  appended  to  Hamilton's  Edition  of  Reid's  Essays. 


300  INQUIRY    INTO    THE    NATURE    OP    CONSCIENCE. 

pushed  us,  we  would  at  length  be  carried  back  to  a  principle 
which  could  not  be  resolved  into  anything  simpler,  and  which  we 
must  therefore  just  assume.  Now,  we  assert  at  once  that  it  is  by 
an  un resolvable  principle  that  the  mind  decides,  when  voluntary 
acts  pass  under  their  notice,  that  they  are  right  or  that  they  are 
wrong.  It  seems  evident  to  us,  on  the  one  hand,  that  this  prin- 
ciple cannot  be  resolved  into  any  of  those  intellectual  axioms  on 
which  the  understanding  proceeds  in  acquiring  knowledge.  Com- 
pound and  decompound  these  as  we  please,  they  will  never  lead 
to  the  ideas  of  right  and  wrong ;  nor,  on  the  other  hand,  can  it 
be  resolved,  into  those  principles  which  are  connected  with  the  de- 
sire of  pleasure,  or  the  aversion  to  pain.  No  composition  of  such 
ideas  or  feelings  could  produce  the  idea  or  feeling  expressed  in  the 
words  "ought,"  "duty,"  "moral  obligation,"  "desert,"  "guilt."  As 
well,  in  our  view,  might  we  talk  of  a  combination  of  gases,  or  of  any 
other  corporeal  substance,  producing  an  idea,  as  of  mere  intellec- 
tual ideas,  or  mere  emotions  connected  with  the  sensations  of 
pleasure  and  pain,  producing  a  sense  of  moral  obligation.  Even 
as  no  composition  of  colors  can  produce  sound,  and  no  composition 
of  odors  produce  colors,  so,  as  it  appears  to  us,  no  possible  combi- 
nation of  intellectual  conceptions,  or  sensations  of  pleasure  and 
pain,  or  of  the  desires  connected  with  these,  can  produce  moral 
approbation  and  disapprobation. 

We  are  thus  brought  to  the  conclusion,  that  the  mind  declares 
that  there  is  an  indelible  distinction  between  good  and  evil;  just 
as  it  declares  that  there  is  an  indelible  distinction  between  truth 
and  error.  We  believe  that  the  mind,  in  the  one  case  as  in  the 
other,  proceeds  on  its  own  fundamental  principles.  Does  some 
one  insist  on  our  making  this  moral  idea  patent  to  the  reason,  and 
justifying  it  to  the  understanding?  We  reply,  tl\at  the  distinction 
does  not  come  under  the  cognizance  of  the  reason,  any  more 
than  the  difference  of  sounds  can  be  brought  under  the  discern- 
ment of  the  eye,  or  the  difference  of  colors  under  that  of  the  ear. 
If  the  objector  become  proud  and  presumptuous,  and  insist  on  our 
yielding  to  his  demand,  we  ask  him  to  begin  with  demonstrating 
the  axiomatic  principles  on  which  reason  proceeds,  and,  when  he 
has  done  so,  he  may  be  the  better  prepared  to  try  his  skill  upon 
an  analysis  of  moral  principle,  or  rather,  after  having  made  the 
attempt  and  failed,  he  will  be  the  better  prepared  to  acknowledge 
that  there  may  be  moral  principles,  the  existence  of  which  reason 
may  discover,  but  cannot  possibly  analyze. 


INQUIRY    INTO    THE    NATURE    OP    CONSCIENCE.  301 

Call  them  by  what  name  you  please,  you  come  back  in  all  in- 
quiry after  truth  to  principles  which  reason  cannot  demonstrate, 
but  on  which,  on  the  contrary,  all  reasoning  proceeds.  To  deny 
this  is  to  involve 'ourselves  in  the  absurdity  of  an  infinite  series  of 
proofs,  each  hanging  on  the  other,  with  nothing  to  support  them 
or  on  which  to  rest,  or  in  a  circle  of  proof  in  which  there  is  con- 
nection, but  no  origin  or  foundation,  and  no  progress. 

In  like  manner,  in  the  inquiry  into  virtue  and  vice  we  come 
back  to  ultimate  principles,  on  which  all  morality  rests.  Just  as 
the  former  class  of  principles  are  anterior  in  the  order  of  things  to 
all  exercise  of  the  reasoning  faculties,  so  the  latter  are  anterior  to 
every  given  exercise  of  the  conscience. 

To  justify  any  given  proposition  to  the  reason,  we  have  only  to 
show  how  it  is  built  on  the  fundamental  principles  of  reason. 
This  being  done,  reason  makes  no  further  inquiry,  it  is  now  com- 
pletely satisfied.  The  scepticism  which  insists  on  something  far- 
ther is  not  sanctioned  by  reason,  but  rather  requires  to  set  itself 
against  reason,  and  reason  in  all  its  acts  condemns  it. 

In  like  manner,  the  mind  is  satisfied  Tvhen  you  have  shown 
that  an  action  is  reconcilable  with  the  fundamental  principles  of 
morality.  When  this  is  done,  it  asks  no  more  questions.  If 
farther  questions  are  put,  the  mind  does  not  in  any  way  beat  re- 
sponsive to  them — indeed,  it  cannot  so  much  as  comprehend 
them. 

While  the  reason  and  its  fundamental  principles,  and  the  con- 
science with  its  fundamental  principles,  are  in  many  respects 
analogous  to.  yet  they  are  at  the  same  time  independent  of  each 
other.  The  reason  does  not  feel  that  it  is  called  to  justify  itself 
to  the  conscience,  nor  is  the  conscience  required  to  justify  itself  to 
the  reason.  Bach  has  its  own  assigned  province,  in  which  it  is 
sovereign  and  supreme.  A  thousand  errors  have  arisen  from  im- 
agining that  the  conscience  should  give  account  of  itself  to  reason, 
and  that  the  reason  should  give  account  of  itself  to  the  conscience. 
Each  in  its  own  sphere  is  independent,  and  it  cannot  in  that 
sphere  interfere  with  or  clash  with  the  other.  While  independent 
in  themselves  they  must,  however,  as  residing  in  the  same  mind, 
and  frequently  judging  of  different  qualities  of  the  same  concrete 
object,  have  multiplied  points  of  affinity.  • 

Understanding  by  conscience  the  exercise  of  the  mind,  when 
the  voluntary  acts  of  responsible  agents  are  submitted  to  it,  we 
may  profitably  view  it  under  three  aspects.  It  may  be  viewed 


302  INQUIRY    INTO    THE   NATURE    OP    CONSCIENCE. 

first,  as  a  law,  the  law  on  which  the  mind  proceeds ;  secondly,  aa 
a  faculty  pronouncing  a  judgment  on  certain  acts  presented  to  it ; 
and  thirdly,  as  a  sentiment  or  sense,  inasmuch  as  emotions  in* 
variably  rise  up  upon  certain  actions  being  apprehended  as  virtu- 
ous or  vicious. 

FlRST,    CONSCIENCE     MAY    BE    CONSIDERED    AS    A    LAW.       We 

believe  it  to  be  an  original,  a  divinely  implanted,  and  a  funda- 
mental law.  Still,  though  persons  could  succeed  in  analyzing  it, 
it  would  not  the  less  be  a  law.  Take  even  the  views  of  Brown 
and  Mackintosh,  meagre  though  they  appear  to  us  to  be,  and  sup- 
pose that  there  is  nothing  else  in  the  mind  when  contemplating 
moral  actions,  but  the  springing  up  of  emotions,  still  there  must 
be  a  heaven-appointed  law,  otherwise  the  emotions  would  not  be 
so  invariable.  Those  who  resolve  conscience  into  a  mere  class  of 
emotions  cannot  thereby  free  themselves  from  assuming  the  exist- 
ence of  a  law,  the  law  according  to  which  the  emotions  are  pro- 
duced. Those  again,  who  regard  it  as  a  faculty  must  assume  a 
rule  as  the  basis  of  its  operations.  "  Upon  whatever,"  says  Adam 
Smith,  "  we  suppose  tRat  our  moral  faculties  are  founded,  whether 
upon  a  certain  modification  of  reason,  upon  an  original  instinct 
called  a  moral  sense,  or  on  some  other  principle  of  our  nature,  it 
cannot  be  doubted  that  they  are  given  us  for  the  direction  of  our 
conduct  in  this  life."  "  The  rules,  therefore,  which  they  prescribe 
are  to  be  regarded  as  the  command  and  laws  of  the  Deity,  pro- 
mulgated by  those  vicegerents  which  he  has  set  up  within  us.''  * 
It  was  under  this  aspect  that  the  ancients  delighted  to  contem- 
plate the  moral  faculty,  as  in  the  well-known  passage  of  Cicero, — 
"right  reason  is  itself  a  law,  congenial  to  the  feelings  of  nature 
diffused  among  all  other  men,  uniform,  eternal,  calling  us  imperi- 
ously to  our  duty,  and  peremptorily  prohibiting  every  violation  of 
it."  "Nor  does  it  speak  one  language  at  Rome,  and  another  at 
Athens,  varying  from  place  to  place,  or  from  time  to  time ;  but  it 
addresses  itself  to  all  nations  and  to  all  ages,  deriving  its  authority 
from  the  common  sovereign  of  the  universe,  and  carrying  home 
its  sanctions  to  every  breast  by  the  inevitable  punishment  which 
it  inflicts  on  transgressors."  It  is  under  this  same  view  that  it  is 
presented  to  us  by  a  still  higher  authority, — "  They  who  have  no 
law  (tio  written  law)  are  a  law  unto  themselves,  which  shows  the 
law  written  in  their  hearts."  It  is  under  this  same  aspect  that  the 
profound  German  metaphysician  represents  it  when  he  talks  of 
*  Theory  of  Moral  Sentiments,  p.  iii.  chap.  v. 


INQUIRY    INTO    THE    NATURE    OP    CONSCIENCE.  303 

categorical  imperative.  It  is  to  be  regretted  that  some  later  ethi- 
cal writers  have  very  much  lost  sight  of  this  view  of  conscience, 
though  perhaps  the  most  important  that  can  be  taken. 

We  have  but  to  pause  and  seriously  reflect  for  an  instant,  to 
discover  that  great  advantages  must  arise  from  morality  assuming 
the  form  of  a  law.  It  is  in  this  character  that  it  acquires  a  clearly 
defined,  a  solid  and  consistent  shape,  and  an  authoritative  power. 
As  a  law,  it  has  its  clear  precepts,  its  binding  obligations,  and  its 
solemn  sanctions.  When  it  is  presented  merely  as  a  sentiment, 
we  have  an  impression  as  if  it  might  vary  with  change  of  circum- 
stances, or  with  man's  varied  feelings,  and  we  might  be*tempted, 
with  Rousseau,  to  recommend  as  right  whatever  our  feelings  im- 
pelled us  to.  But  in  acknowledging  it  as  a  law,  we  place  it  above 
everything  that  is  fleeting  and  variable,  and  give  it  an  indepen- 
dent, an  unchangeable,  and  eternal  authority. 

The  moral  law  serves  the  same  purpose,  but  in  an  infinitely 
higher  degree  in  the  government  of  intelligent  and  responsible 
beings,  as  physical  law  does  in  regard  to  inanimate  objects  and  the 
brute  creation.  All  the  works  of  God  seem  to  be  under  law  of 
some  kind.  The  heavens  and  the  earth  obey  the  ordinances  of 
God's  appointment,  and  the  lower  animals  are  led  by  the  instincts 
with  which  the  Creator  has  endowed  them.  When  we  ascend  the 
scale  of  creation,  we  find  that  God's  intelligent  and  responsible 
creatures  are  still  under  law,  but  that  law  of  a  higher  kind,  a 
moral  law  summed  up  in  love.  This  law  is  the  golden  chain  by 
which  the  governor  of  the  universe  binds  his  intelligent  creatures 
to.  himself  and  to  one  another.  It  is  the  royal  law  of  love,  worthy 
of  God,  who  is  love,  and  fitted  to  make  those  who  obey  it  supreme- 
ly happy  in  themselves  and  in  the  enjoyment  of  God.  In  the 
observance  of  that  law,  God  is  glorified,  and  the  creature  is  un- 
speakably blessed.  In  the  breaking  of  that  law,  the  God  who  ap- 
pointed it  is  dishonored,  and  the  transgressor  lands  himself  in  guilt 
and  misery. 

As  it  is  advantageous  to  put  morality  on  the  footing  of  a  law, 
it  is  no  less  beneficial  that  this  law  should  be  written  upon  the 
heart.  It  is  difficult  to  see  how  it  could  have  any  power  over  any 
given  individual,  except  by  its  having  a  place  in  the  inner  man. 
But  does  some  one  suggest  that  it  might  be  communicated  orally, 
or  in  writing,  to  the  creature  by  the  Creator  ?  No  one,  who  has 
seriously  reflected  on  the  subject,  will  deny  that  much  benefit  may 
be  derived  from  the  possession  of  such  a  law,  spoken  or  written, 


304  INQUIRY    INTO    THE    NATURE    OP    CONSCIENCE. 

But  such  an  outward  law  does  not  render  an  inward  principle  un- 
necessary. For  the  question  presses  itself  upon  us,  why  are  we 
bound  to  obey  this  law  ?  Is  it  answered,  because  it  is  good  ? — the 
farther  question  is  now  raised,  how  do  we  know  it  to  be  good  ? 
Or  is  it  answered,  that  we  are  bound  to  obey  it,  because  of  the 
very  relation  in  which  we  stand  to  God,  we  have  thereby  moved 
the  difficulty  but  a  step  back ;  for  the  question  suggests  itself,  why 
are  we  bound  to  obey  God  ?  We  are  bound  to  obey  God,  solely 
because  of  a  moral  relation  ;  and  there  must  be  an  internal  law  to 
inform  us  of  that  relation.  It  thus  appears,  that  every  outward 
law  conducts  us  to  an  inward  'principle,  from  which  it  receives  its 
sanction. 

Such  an  internal  principle  or  law  written  in  the  heart,  if  only 
in  healthy  exercise,  must  possess  many  advantages  over  a  mere 
written  or  verbal  law.  It  is  quick,  ready,  and  instant.  It  acts  as 
a  constant  monitor.  It  lies  at  the  seat  of  the  will  and  the  affec- 
tions ;  and  is  ready  to  operate  upon  both.  But  while  it  is  in  its 
very  nature  anterior  and  superior  to  an  outward  law,  it  may  yet 
be  greatly  aided  by  such  a  law.  Those  who  possess  the  inward 
principle,  will  find  consistency  and  stability  imparted  to  their  con- 
duct, by  their  embodying  the  dictates  of  that  principle  in  a  code 
of  precepts.  It  is  conceivable,  therefore,  that  the  possession  of  the 
internal  monitor  may  not  supersede  the  development  of  positive 
commandments,  even  among  holy  intelligences.  And  when  the 
conscience  is  perverted,  or  when  it  is  not  in  a  lively  state,  it  is  ab- 
solutely necessary,  in  order  to  its  rectification,  that  there  be  an 
outward  law  embodying,  clearly  and  correctly,  the  will  of  God, 
and  acting  the  same  part  as  the  dial,  when  it  rectifies  the  dis- 
ordered time-piece. 

Not  only  is  conscience  a  law,  it  is,  as  Butler  has  shown,  the  su- 
preme law.  "  Thus  that  principle  by  which  we  survey,  and  either 
approve  or  disapprove  of  our  own  heart,  temper,  and  actions,  is 
not  only  to  be  considered  as  what  in  its  turn  is  to  have  some  influ- 
ence, which  may  be  said  of  every  passion,  of  the  lowest  appetite ; 
but  as  from  its  very  nature  manifestly  claiming  superiority  over 
all  others,  insomuch  that  you  cannot  fornra  notion  of  this  faculty, 
conscience,  without  taking  in  judgment,  direction,  superintendency. 
This  is  a  constituent  part  of  the  idea,  that  is  of  the  faculty  itself; 
and  to  preside  and  govern,  from  the  very  economy  and  constitution 
of  man,  belongs  to  it.  Had  it  strength,  as  it  had  right — had  it 
power,  as  it  had  manifest  authority — it  would  absolutely  govern 


INQUIRY    INTO    THE    NATURE    OF    CONSCIENCE.  305 

the  world."  *  He  adds,  "  This  faculty  was  placed  within  to  be 
our  proper  governor,  to  direct  and  regulate  all  under-principles. 
passions,  and  motives  of  action.  This  is  its  right  and  office. 
Thus  sacred  is  its  authority."  It  exercises  this  function,  it  may 
be  added,  from  the  very  nature  of  the  objects  of  which  it  takes 
cognizance.  These,  according  to  Butler,  are  the  "  whole  heart, 
temper,  and  actions ;"  or  according  to  Mackintosh,  the  "  mental 
dispositions  leading  to  voluntary  actions,  and  the  voluntary  actions, 
which  flow  from  these  dispositions."  Subject  only  to  God,  it  re- 
views all  the  actions  of  the  responsible  agent,  and  is  itself  reviewed 
by  none.  It  is  the  highest  judicatory  in  the  human  mind,  judging 
all,  and  being  judged  of  none;  admitting  of  appeal  from  all.  and 
admitting  of  no  appeal  from  itself  to  any  other  human  tribunal 
The  conscience  is  a  universal  arbiter,  for  all  dispositions  and  vo- 
luntary acts  pass  under  its  notice.  It  is  immutable,  for  it  pro- 
nounces its  judgments  upon  an  unchangeable  law.  It  is  supreme, 
for  while  it  submits  to  none  other,  it  judges  of  the  exercise  of  all 
the  other  faculties  and  affections  of  the  mind. 

SECONDLY,  THE  CONSCIENCE  MAY  BE  CONSIDERED  AS  A 
FACULTY.  In  doing  so,  we  are  not  viewing  it  under  an  aspect  in- 
consistent with  that  under  which  we  have  just  been  contemplating 
it.  For  every  quality  and  every  faculty  has  a  rule  of  operation, 
which  may  be  described  as  its  law.  The  conscience,  from  its 
nature  may  be  held  as  embracing  within  it,  in  a  peculiar  manner, 
a  law  as  the  rule  of  its  exercise ;  and  this,  as  we  have  seen,  a  law 
of  a  very  authoritative  character.  But  while  we  view  it  as  a  law, 
we  are  not  the  less  to  view  it  as  a  faculty,  of  which  this  law  is  but 
the  function  or  the  exponent. 

Some  later  ethical  and  metaphysical  writers,  we  are  aware, 
have  maintained  that  there  is  no  judgment  passed  by  the  mind  on 
moral  relations  being  presented  to  it.  The  whole  mental  process 
is  represented  as  being  one  of  the  emotions,  and  not  of  the  judg- 
ment or  reason.  And  it  is  at  once  to  be  acknowledged,  that  if  we 
define  the  reason  or  understanding  as  the  power  or  powers  which 
distinguish  between  the  true  and  the  false,  or  which  judge  of  re- 
lations, as  of  the  resemblances  and  differences  of  objects,  we  must 
place  morality  altogether  beyond  its  jurisdiction.  Perceptions  of 
this  kind  are  in  their  whole  nature  different  from  the  perceptions 
of  the  difference  between  right  and  wrong — between  duty  and  sin. 
But  if  it  be  meant  to  affirm,  that  when  the  voluntary  acts  of  re- 
*  Human  Nature,  Sermon  ii. 


306  INaUIRY    INTO    THE    NATURE    OF    CONSCIENCE. 

sponsible  beings  pass  in  review  before  the  mind,  it  does  not  pro- 
nounce a  judgment  or  decision,  then  we  cannot  but  hold  the  view 
to  be  inconsistent  with  our  consciousness,  and  as  far  from  being 
well  fitted  to  furnish  a  foundation  to  a  proper  ethical  theory.  Just 
as  the  mind,  on  certain  purely  intellectual  propositions  being  pre- 
sented to  it,  says,  "  this  is  true,"  or  "  this  is  false ;"  so  we  find  it 
on  the  voluntary  actions  of  intelligent  beings  being  presented  to 
it,  declaring,  "  this  is  right,"  or  "  this  is  wrong." 

The  parties  who  are  most  inclined  to  remove  morality  from  the 
region  of  the  understanding,  such  as  Brown  and  Mackintoshr 
are  often  constrained  to  speak  of  the  moral  faculty,  and  to  talk  of 
its  decisions  and  judgments.  The  very  language  which  they  use, 
in  speaking  of  the  emotions  which  are  supposed  by  them  to  con- 
stitute the  whole  mental  process — the  emotions,  as  they  call  them, 
of  moral  approbation  and  disapprobation — seems  to  imply  that 
there  must  be  a  judgment  of  the  mind.  If  approbation  and  disap- 
probation are  not  judgments,  we  know  not  what  can  constitute  a 
judgment  of  the  mind.  "  We  cannot,"  says  Butler,  "  form  a  notion 
of  this  faculty,  without  taking  in  judgment."*  Nor  is  it  possible 
to  find  language  expressive  of  the  mental  phenomena  which  does 
not  imply,  that  along  with  the  emotion,  there  is  a  judgment  come 
to  and  a  decision  pronounced  ;  and  it  would  be  confounding  the 
different  departments  of  the  human  mind  altogether,  to  refer  such 
a  judgment  to  our  emotional  nature,  or  mere  sensibility. 

We  apprehend  a  mathematical  proposition,  and  we  declare  it  to 
be  true ;  here  there  is  acknowledged  on  all  hands  to  be  a  judg- 
ment. We  apprehend  next  instant  a  cruel,  ungenerous  action  ; 
and  we  declare  it  to  be  wrong.  Now,  in  the  one  case,  as  in  the 
other,  there  is  a  judgment  of  the  mind.  It  is  true,  that  in  the  two 
cases,  the  judgments  are  pronounced  according  to  very  different 
principles  or  laws — so  very  different  as  to  justify  us  in  speaking  of 
the  conscience  as  different  from  the  reason.  It  is  quite  conceivable 
that  the  mind  might  possess  reason,  and  distinguish  between  the 
true  and  the  false,  and  yet  be  incapable  of  distinguishing  between 
virtue  and  vice.  We  are  entitled  therefore  to  hold,  that  the  draw- 
ing of  moral  distinctions  is  not  comprehended  in  the  simple  exer- 
cise of  the  reason.  The  conscience,  in  short,  is  a  different  faculty 
of  the  mind  from  the  mere  understanding.  We  must  hold  it  to  be 
simple  and  unresolvable,  till  we  fall  in  with  a  successful  decompo- 
sition of  it  into  its  elements.  In  the  absence  of  any  such  decom- 
*  Human  Nature,  Sermon  il 


INQUIRY   INTO   THE    NATURE    OP   CONSCIENCE.  307 

position,  we  hold  that  there  are  no  simpler  elements  in  the 
human  mind  which  will  yield  us  the  ideas  of  the  morally  good 
and  evil,  of  moral  obligation  and  guilt,  of  merit  and  demerit. 
Compound  and  decompound  all  other  ideas  as  you  please — asso- 
ciate them  together  as  you  may — they  will  never  give  us  the  ideas 
referred  to,  so  peculiar  and  full  of  meaning,  without  a  faculty  im- 
planted in  the  mind  for  this  very  purpose. 

This  faculty  has  to  do  with  a  particular  class  of  objects,  in 
regard  to  which  it  judges  and  pronounces  a  decision.  "  There  is 
a  principle  of  reflection,"  says  Butler,  "  in  men,  by  which  they  dis- 
tinguish between,  approve  and  disapprove  of  their  own  actions. 
We  are  plainly  constituted  such  sort  of  creatures  as  to  reflect  on 
our  own  nature.  The  mind  can  take  a  view  of  what  passes  within 
itself,  its  propensities,  aversions,  passions,  affections,  as  respecting 
such  objects,  and  in  such  degrees,  and  of  the  several  actions  con- 
sequent thereupon.  In  this  survey  it  approves  of  one,  disapproves 
of  another,  and  towards  a  third,  is  affected  in  neither  of  these 
ways,  but  is  quite  indifferent.  This  principle  in  man,  by  which 
he  approves  or  disapproves  of  his  heart,  temper,  and  actions,  is 
conscience — for  this  is  the  strict  sense  of  the  word,  though  some- 
times it  is  used  so  as  to  take  in  more."*  This  greatest  of  all 
ethical  writers  tells  us  farther, — "  There  is  a  superior  principle  of 
reflection  or  conscience  in  every  man,  which  distinguishes  between 
the  internal  principles  of  his  heart,  as  well  as  his  external  actions, 
which  passes  judgment  upon  himself,  and  upon  them  pronounces 
determinately  some  actions  to  be  in  themselves  just,  right,  good, 
others  to  be  in  themselves  evil,  wrong,  unjust,  which  without  being 
•consulted,  without  being  advised  with,  magisterially  exerts  itself, 
arid  disapproves  or  condemns  him  the  doer  of  them  accordingly, 
and  which,  if  not  forcibly  stopped,  naturally  and  always,  of  course, 
goes  on  to  anticipate  a  higher  and  more  effectual  sentence  which 
shall  hereafter  second  and  affirm  its  own."t 

THIRDLY,  CONSCIENCE  MAY  BE  CONSIDERED  AS  POSSESSING 

A    CLASS    OP    EMOTIONS,    OR     AS    A    SENTIMENT.       We    have     en- 

deavored,  indeed,  to  show  that  it  is  not  a  mere  emotion,  or  class  of 
emotions.  But  while  it  is  something  more  than  a  "  class  of  feel- 
ings,"— it  is  so  described  by  Mackintosh — it  does  most  assuredly 
contain  and  imply  feelings.  The  mind  is  as  conscious  of  the 
emotions  as  it  is  of  the  judgment. 

In  opposition  to  those  who  insist  that  there  is  nothing  but 
*  Human  Nature,  Sermon  L  f  Ibid.,  Sermon  il 


308  INQUIRY    INTO   THE    NATURE    OF    CONSCIENCE. 

emotion,  it  might  be  urged,  in  a  general  way,  that  emotions  neve? 
exist  independently  of  certain  conceptions  or  ideas.  Let  a  man 
stop  himself  at  the  time  when  emotion  is  the  highest  and  passion 
the  strongest,  and  he  will  find  as  the  substratum  of  the  whole,  a 
certain  apprehension  or  conception  formed  by  the  faculties  of  the 
mind.  There  is  an  idea  acting  as  the  basis  of  every  feeling,  and 
so  far  determining  the  feeling  :  and  the  feeling  rises  or  falls  accord- 
ing as  the  conception  takes  in  more  or  less  of  that  which  raises 
the  emotions.  The  ideas  which  raise  emotions  have  been  called 
(by  Alison  in  his  Essay  on  Taste)  "  ideas  of  emotions." 

The  conception  of  certain  objects  is  no  way  fitted  to  raise 
emotions.  The  conception,  for  instance,  of  an  angle,  or  of  a  stone, 
or  a  house,  will  not  excite  any  emotions  whatever.  Other  concep- 
tions do  as  certainly  raise  emotions,  as  the  conception  of  an  object 
as  about  to  communicate  pleasure  or  pain.  Such  feelings  arise 
whether  we  conlesnplate  this  pleasure  or  pain  as  about  to  visit 
ourselves  or  others. 

Emotion  rises  not  only  on  the  contemplation  of  pleasure  an< 
pain  to  ourselves  or  others,  it  rises  also  on  the  contemplation  ot 
virtue  and  vice.  When  the  conscience  declares  an  action  pre- 
sented to  the  mind  to  be  good  or  bad,  certain  emotions  instantly 
present  themselves.  Man  is  so  constituted  that  the  contemplation 
of  virtuous  and  vicious  action — declared  so  to  be  by  the  conscience 
—like  the  contemplation  of  pleasure  and  pain,  awakens  the  sensi- 
bility. 

While  thus  the  conception  determines  the  emotions — does 
not  constitute  them,  however — it  is  not  to  be  forgotten  that  emotions 
have  a  most  powerful  influence  upon  the  current  of  the  thoughts 
and  ideas.  The  emotions  may  be  compared  to  fluids  which  press 
equally  in  all  directions,  and  need,  therefore,  a  vessel  to  contain 
them,  or  a  channel  formed  in  which  they  may  flow  ;  but  like  these 
fluids,  they  yield  the  strongest  of  all  pressure,  and  serve  most  im- 
portant purposes  in  the  economy  of  life. 

Upon  these  general  grounds,  then,  we  would  be  inclined  to 
assert  that  there  must  be  the  decision  of  a  faculty  before  there  can 
be  a  feeling-  in  regard  to  moral  actions.  "At  the  same  time,"  says 
Cousin,  "  that  we  do  such  and  such  an  act,  it  raises  in  our  mind 
a  judgment  which  declares  its  character,  and  it  is  on  the  back  of 
tins  judgment  that  our  sensibility  is  moved.  The  sentiment  is  not 
this  primitive  and  immediate  judgment,  but  is  its  powerful  echo. 
So  far  from  being  the  foundation  of  the  idea  of  the  good,  it  sup- 


INQUIRY    INTO-  THE    NATURE    OF    CONSCIENCE.  309 

poses  it."*  On  the  other  hand,  we  acknowledge  that  the  existence 
of  the  feeling1  has  a  most  powerful  reflex  influence  in  quickening 
the  faculty.  It  breathes  life  into,  and  lends  wings  to  what  would 
otherwise  be  so  inert  and  inanimate.  But  we  must  quit  these 
general  grounds.  The  connection  between  the  emotions  and  their 
relative  conceptions  has  not  received  that  attention  which  it  de- 
serves from  mental  analysts.  It  is  a  topic  lying  open  to  the  first 
voyager  who  may  have  sufficient  courage  and  skill  to  explore, 
without  making  shipwreck  of  himself,  the  capes  and  bays  by 
which  this  land  and  water  indent  each  other. 

The  moral  faculty,  then,  can  never  be  employed  without  emo- 
tion. It  is  the  master  power  of  the  human  soul,  and  it  is  befitting 
that  it  should  never  move  without  a  retinue  of  attendants.  These 
feelings,  which  are  its  necessary  train  or  accompaniment  in  all  its 
exercises,  impart  to  them  all  their  liveliness  and  fervor.  They 
communicate  to  the  soul  that  noble  elevation  which  it  feels  on  the 
contemplation  of  benevolence,  of  devotedness  in  a  good  cause,  and 
patriotism  and  piety  under  all  their  forms.  These  attendants  of 
this  monarch  faculty,  while  they  gladden  and  manifest  its  presence 
when  the  will  is  obedient  to  its  master,  are  at  the  same  time  ready 
to  become  the  avenging  spirits  which  follow  up  the  commission  of 
crime  with  more  fearful  lashings  than  the  serpent-covered  furies 
were  ever  supposed  to  have  inflicted.  In  short,  the  conscience 
travels  like  a  court  of  justice,  with  a  certain  air  of  dignity,  and 
with  its  attendant  ministers  to  execute  its  decisions.  All  this  is 
as  it  should  be.  If  it  is  desirable,  as  we  have  seen,  that  morality 
should  be  presented  under  the  character  of  a  law,  and  that  it 
should  have  its  appropriate  faculty,  it  is  equally  needful  that  it 
should  have  its  train  of  feelings,  to  give  a  practical  interest  and 
impetus  to  all  the  authoritative  decisions  which  this  judge  pro- 
nounces. "  The  design  of  the  sentiment."  it  is  finely  remarked  by 
Cousin,  "is  to  render  sensible  to  the  soul  the  connection  of  virtue 
and  happiness."! 

It  is  always  to  be  borne  in  mind  however,  that  the  simple  pos- 
session of  conscience,  with  its  accompanying  emotions,  does  not 
render  any  individual  virtuous.  We' are  made  virtuous,  not  by 
the  possession  of  the  faculty  which  judges  of  virtuous  action,  or 
of  the  emotions  which  echo  its  decisions,  but  by  the  possession  of 
the  virtuous  actions  themselves.  This  may  seem  an  obvious  truth 
when  it  is  stated ;  but  it  has  been  strangely  overlooked  by  many 
*  Du  Bien.  (Euvres,  voL  il  p  265.  f  Ibid,  p.  314. 


310  INQ.UIRY    INTO   THE    NATURE    OF    CONSCIENCE. 

persons,  who  conclude  that  man  is  virtuous,  because  he  is 
sed  of  such  a  power  and  of  its  responsive  feelings.  These  per- 
sons do  not  reflect  that  the  faculty  and  its  accompanying  senti- 
ment are  ready  to  condemn  the  possessor  of  them,  when  he  is  with- 
out the  affections  and  actions,  in  which  virtue  truly  consists.  We 
believe  that  there  is  no  responsible  agent  so  fallen  and  corrupted 
that  he  does  not  possess  this  conscience  and  these  feelings  ; — both, 
it  may  be,  are  sadly  perverted  in  their  exercise — yet  still  he  pos- 
sesses them  in  their  essential  form,  and  that  by  the  appointment 
of  God,  in  order  that  they  may  so  far  punish  him,  and  enable 
him  to  measure  the  depth  of  his  degradation. 

The  poet,  the  tragedian,  the  novelist — all  address  themselves  to- 
these  feelings,  and  seek  to  call  forth  our  moral  emotions  by  the 
description  or  exhibitions  of  scenes,  in  which  tempted  chastity 
stands,  and  suffering  virtue  is  triumphant,  and  patriotism  burns- 
with  a  flame  all  the  brighter,  because  of  the  surrounding  dark- 
ness and  apostasy  ;  or  changing  the  scene,  they  would  rouse  our 
feelings  of  indignation,  and  terror,  and  pity,  by  the  pictures  of 
powerful  villany  and  deceit  spreading  misery  among  the  innocent 
and  the  helpless.  It  is  not  to  our  present  purpose  to  inquire 
whether  such  representations  do  really  strengthen  the  moral  fac- 
ulty and  refine  its  sensibility  ;  or  whether  they  do  not  rather,  by 
their  vain  shows,  carry  us  into  an  imaginary  world,  from  which 
we  return  with  less  ability  and  inclination,  faithfully  to  perform 
our  part  in  the  actual  world.  We  call  attention  to  these  phenom- 
ena for  two  purposes  ;  one  is  to  show,  that  there  are  such  feelings 
which  can  be  operated  on  ;  and  the  other,  to  guard  against  the 
idea,  that  the  possession  of  these  feelings  constitutes  any  indi- 
vidual a  virtuous  agent.  Thousands  have  wept  in  the  theatre 
over  the  trials  of  suffering  chastity,  and  have  gone  out  to  com- 
mit deeds  of  impurity,  and  thereby  to  increase  the  temptations  to 
licentiousness,  and  multiply  the  sufferings  of  those  outcasts  who 
yield  to  them.  The  novel  has  been  stained  by  many  a  tear,  flow- 
ing from  eyes  which  never  wept  over  the  real  miseries  of  the  poor. 
Sterne  causing  us  to  weep  over  the  dead  ass,  and  meanwhile 
treating  his  own  parent  with  unkindness,  is  only  one  of  a  thou- 
sand instances  recorded  in  the  history  of  man,  to  demonstrate  that 
the  feelings  which  arise  on  the  presentation  of  good  or  evil  actions, 
all  belong  to  a  different  department  of  the  human  mind,  from  the 
virtuous  affections  themselves.  On  account  of  not  observing  this 
distinction,  multitudes  have  thought  themselves  good,  because: 


INQ.TJIRY    INTO    THE    NATURE    OF    CONSCIENCE.  311 

they  have  a  capacity  of  admiring  what  is  good.  It  is  the  grand 
error  of  not  a  few  of  the  most  powerful  writers  in  the  present  day, 
to  suppose  that  hero-worship  and  heroism  are  allied  to  each 
other;  that  the  man  who  admires  the  hero,  has  himself  a  kin- 
dred taste.  From  the  same  cause,  philosophers  and  ethical 
writers  have  drawn  far  too  flattering  a  picture  of  human  charac- 
ter, and  leave  upon  us  the  impression,  that  because  mankind  pos- 
sess feelings  of  complacency  on  the  contemplation  of  virtue,  they 
are  therefore  possessed  of  virtue  itself. 

The  view  now  offered  of  conscience,  from  the  way  in  which  we 
have  been  obliged  to  state  it,  may  seem  a  very  complex  one.  In 
reality,  it  is  very  simple.  It  is  to  be  regretted,  that  in  giving  a 
description  of  any  mental  state,  we  are  constrained  to  use  lan- 
guage which  sounds  so  abstract  and  metaphysical.  The  con- 
science is  the  mind  acting  according  to  a  moral  law,  and  its 
judgments  giving  rise  to  emotions.  We  do  not  see  how  anything 
could  be  simpler. 

The  writer  who  is  generally  acknowledged  to  have  written  in. 
the  most  masterly  way  on  the  conscience,  seems  to  have  viewed 
it  in  the  light  now  presented.  He  was  not  required,  for  the  object 
which  he  had  in  view,  to  give  a  psychological  analysis  of  it ;  but. 
it  is  evident,  that  he  views  it  under  the  threefold  aspect  in  which 
it  is  presented.  Sir  James  Mackintosh  blames  him  for  not  stead- 
ily presenting  conscience  under  one  aspect — that  is,  for  not  repre- 
senting it  as  merely  a  "class  of  feelings."*  That  which  Mack- 
intosh represents  as  a  defect,  we  hold  to  be  an  excellence.  He 
calls  it  again  and  again  a  "  principle,"  and  a  "  law,"  the  "  prin- 
ciple of  reflection  and  conscience,"  and  the  "  law  of  his  creation," 
and  "  a  determinate  rule,"  and  "  the  guide  of  life,  and  that  by 
which  men  are  a  law  unto  themselves ;"  and  affirms,  that  "  every 
man  may  find  within  himself  the  rule  of  right  and  obligations  to 
follow  it."  That  he  regarded  the  conscience  as  partaking  both  of 
the  nature  of  a  faculty  and  a  feeling,  is  evident  from  his  calling  it 
a  "  faculty  in  the  heart,"  and  more  particularly  from  the  following 
passage :  "  It  is  manifest,  that  great  part  of  common  language, 
and  of  common  behaviour  over  the  world,  is  formed  on  the  suppo- 
sition of  such  a  moral  faculty,  whether  called  conscience,  moral 
reason,  moral  sense,  or  Divine  reason,  whether  considered  as  a 
sentiment  of  the  understanding,  or  a  perception  of  the  heart,  or, 
which  seems  the  truth,  as  including  both" 

*  See  Prelim.  Diss.  p.  346,  "  He  falters  as  he  approaches  it,"  <fec. 


312  COMMON    QUALITY    OF    VIRTUOUS    ACTION. 

We  have  a  complete  view  of  the  conscience  only  when  we  look 
at  it  under  this  three-fold  aspect,  in  this  its  triune  nature.  In  each 
of  these  characters  it  serves  a  separate  purpose.  As  a  law  fun- 
damental in  the  human  mind,  it  reveals  authoritatively  the  will 
of  God.  As  a  faculty,  it  is  a  master  ever  ready  to  issue  com- 
mands, and  an  arbiter  ever  ready  to  decide.  As  a  sentiment,  it 
furnishes  pleasure,  stirs  up  desire,  and  leads  to  activity.  Nor  is  it 
unworthy  of  being  remarked,  that  it  is  in  its  very  nature  con- 
nected, both  with  the  understanding  and  the  feelings,  partaking 
of  the  strength  and  stability  of  the  one,  and  the  life  and  facility 
of  the  other.  It  is  the  "faculty  of  the  heart,"  and  the  "senti- 
ment of  the  understanding."  While  thus  linking  itself  with  all 
parts  of  our  nature,  it  speaks  as  one  having  authority  to  every 
other  power  and  principle  of  the  human  mind.  If  this  "faculty 
of  the  heart"  were  allowed  its  proper  power,  it  would,  in  the 
name  of  the  supreme  Governor,  preserve  for  him — that  is,  for  God 
—the  place  which  he  ought  to  have  in  every  human  head  and 
heart. 

SECTION  V.— COMMON  QUALITY  OF  VIRTUOUS  ACTION. 

The  inquiry  into  the  nature  of  virtue  is  different  from  the  in- 
quiry into  the  nature  of  conscience,  though  the  two  have  often 
been  confounded.  We  are  now  to  inquire,  In  what  does  virtue 
consist,  or  what  is  the  quality  common  to  all  right  action  ? 

Whatever  tbis  quality  be,  it  is  evident  that  it  must  be  some- 
thing in  the  virtuous  agent.  What  is  a  virtuous  action,  but  an 
agent  acting  virtuously;  it  is  a  virtuous  state  of  the  mind.  The 
common  quality  of  virtuous  action  must  therefore  be  some  quality 
of  the  agent.  The  proposition  needs  only  to  be  announced,  to 
command  universal  assent. 

Though  self-evident,  when  formally  stated,  this  proposition  has 
been  overlooked  by  a  vast  number  of  ethical  and  metaphysical 
writers.  If  it  had  been  kept  steadily  in  view  no  one  would  have 
represented  virtue,  with  Clarke,  as  consisting  in  eternal  fitness  ; 
nor  with  Hume,  as  consisting  in  the  useful  and  agreeable ;  or  as 
the  advocates  of  this  latter  theory  somewhat  modified,  now  place 
it,  in  beneficial  tendency,  or  the  greatest  happiness  principle.  If 
the  supporters  of  this  last  theory  had  so  stated  it  as  to  represent 
the  intent  to  produce  utility,  or  the  purpose  to  do  a  beneficial  act 
*4.s  constituting  virtuous  action,  their  views  would  not  have  been 


COMMON    QUALITY    OF    VIRTUOUS    ACTION.  313 

inconsistent  with  the  proposition  now  laid  down.  But  they  are 
careful  to  inform  us,  that  the  parties  who  perform  the  virtuous  act 
may  not  be  aware,  or  distinctly  conscious  of  its  tendency.  Love 
to  God,  they  tell  us,  is  beneficial ;  but  they  acknowledge  that  the 
person  who  loves  God,  is  not  led  to  do  so  by  a  perception  of  the 
benefit  to  be  derived.  The  utility  or  beneficial  tendency  of  ac- 
tions may  be  observed,  they  say,  by  careful  reflection  ;  but  is  not 
necessarily  before  the  mind  of  the  agent.  They  farther  allow,  in 
regard  to  the  great  mass  of  mankind,  that  they  are  not  in  circum- 
stances to  determine  the  ultimate  tendency  of  actions  ;  that  if 
they  waited  till  they  knew  precisely  all  the  effects  of  their  con- 
duct, they  would  never  act ;  and  that,  if  they  acted  on  their  own 
narrow  short-sighted  views  of  utility,  they  might  perform  the 
most  atrocious  crimes  in  the  name  of  virtue.  The  advocates  of 
the  theory  are  constrained,  in  order  to  obviate  these  difficulties,  to 
acknowledge,  that  though  utility  or  beneficial  tendency  may  be 
the  proper  effect  of  every  virtuous  action,  yet  that  it  has  not 
necessarily  a  place  in  the  intention  of  the  actor.  It  cannot, 
then,  constitute  the  distinguishing  quality  of  virtue.  It  is  not 
so  much  a  part  of  virtue,  as  an  effect  following  from  it,  through 
the  Divine  appointment  and  arrangement  ;  and  an  effect  fol- 
lowing, because  of  the  honor  which  God  would  thus  put  upon 
virtue. 

What  quality,  then,  in  the  mind  of  the  agent  may  be  regarded 
as  constituting  virtue  ?  Butler  does  not  answer  this  question. 
There  are  passages  in  his  Treatise  on  the  Nature  of  Virtue,  which 
show  that  the  subject  had  been  before  him  ;  that  he  knew  the 
question  of  the  nature  of  virtue  to  be  different  from  the  question 
of  the  nature  of  conscience ;  but  that  he  did  not  think  it  neces- 
sary to  prosecute  the  former  inquiry.  He  speaks  of  himself,  as  not 
"  stopping  to  inquire  how  far,  and  in  what  sense,  virtue  is  resolv- 
able into  benevolence,  and  vice  into  the  want  of  it."* 

Hutcheson  has  given  a  distinct  answer  to  the  question,  and  de- 
fended his  theory  with  his  usual  acuteness ;  he  represents  virtue 
as  consisting  in  benevolence.  But  so  far  as  by  benevolence  he 
means  merely  an  instinctive  attachment  springing  up  indepen- 
dently of  the  will,  we  maintain  that  his  theory  is  erroneous ;  for 
in  such  affection,  there  cannot  be  anything  either  virtuous  or  vi- 
cious. Again,  if  by  benevolence  is  meant  simply  good-will  to  a 
neighbor,  or  a  desire  to  promote  his  happiness,  the  scheme  is  all 
*  Nature  of  Virtue. 


314  COMMON    QUALITY    OF   VIRTUOUS    ACTION. 

too  narrow,  for  it  excludes  the  love  of  God,  and  the  holy  affections 
connected  with  it,  and  springing  from  it.  Nor  does  it  seem  pos- 
sible, without  an  extraordinary  straining  and  perversion,  to  in- 
clude one  of  the  most  essential  of  all  the  virtues,  the  virtue  of 
justice,  under  benevolence  understood  in  any  legitimate  accep- 
tation. 

There  are,  we  suspect,  two  essential  mental  elements  in  all 
morally  right  action  ;  there  is  the  will,  and  there  is  righteousness  ; 
there  is  the  will  obeying  the  moral  faculty.  A  responsible  act 
must  always  be  an  act  of  the  will ;  and  when  virtuous,  it  is  an 
act  of  the  will  in  accordance  with  the  fundamental  faculty,  which 
decides  between  right  and  wrong.  It  is  a  voluntary  action,  done 
because  it  is  right. 

FIRST  ELEMENT. — We  regard  the  WILL  as  the  seat  of  all  vir- 
tue and  vice.  There  is  an  act  of  the  will  wherever  there  is  choice, 
preference,  or  resolution — wherever  there  is  wish,  desire,  or  voli- 
tion ;  and  wherever  there  is  none  of  these,  there  we  hold  there 
can  be  no  moral  action.  There  is  nothing  either  moral  or  im- 
moral in  a  mere  intellectual  act,  or  in  a  mere  sensation,  or  a  mere 
emotion.  But  wherever  there  is  a  positive  act  of  the  will — 
wherever  there  is  desire,  choice,  resolution — there  virtue  or  vice 
may  exist. 

Certain  acts  of  the  will,  we  are  aware,  are  neither  virtuous  nor 
vicious.  To  prefer  pleasure  to  pain,  honor  to  disgrace,  society  to 
solitude ;  in  such  acts  as  these,  whether  they  exist  in  the  shape 
of  wish,  desire,  or  volition,  there  is  nothing  morally  approvable,  or 
the  opposite.  The  morality  in  the  will  begins  at  the  place  at 
which  conscience  interposes.  If  it  says,  this  pleasure  is  sinful — 
this  honor  can  be  attained  only  by  unlawful  means — this  society 
is  full  of  peril  to  the  best  interests  of  the  soul ;  and  the  pleasure, 
honor,  and  society  are  still  preferred,  the  party  is  guilty  of  sin. 
In  short,  human  virtue  consists  in  the  will  obeying  the  conscience, 
as  its  law  appointed  by  God  ;  and  vice  consists  in  the  will  set- 
ting the  law  of  conscience  aside,  and  preferring  some  other  good  to 
what  conscience  declares  to  be  the  morally  good. 

We  are  happy  to  find  our  views  on  this  subject  coinciding  in 
the  main  with  those  of  Dr.  Chalmers.  "  We  would  now  affirm," 
says  he,  "the  all-important  principle,  that  nothing  is  moral  or  im- 
moral which  is  not  voluntary.  We  have  often  been  struck  with 
writers  upon  moral  science,  in  that  even  though  professing  a  view 
or  an  argument  altogether  elementary,  they  seldom  come  formally 


COMMON    QUALITY    Jtf    VIRTUOUS    ACTION.  315 

or  ostensibly  forth  with  this  principle."  "  We  think  it  for  the  ad- 
vantage of  our  own  subject,  that  it  should  receive  a  different  treat- 
ment ;  that  it  should  be  announced,  and  with  somewhat  the  pomp 
and  circumstance,  too,  of  a  first  principle,  and  have  the  distinction 
given  to  it,  not  of  a  tacit,  but  of  a  proclaimed  axiom  in  moral 
science."  He  speaks  of  this  principle  as  that  "which  binds  to- 
gether, as  it  were,  the  moral  and  the  voluntary." 

We  maintain,  then,  that  there  can  be  neither  virtue  nor  vice 
where  there  is  no  exercise  of  the  will.  There  is  nothing,  for  ex- 
ample, meritorious  in  the  mere  exercise  of  the  intellectual  faculties. 
Except  in  the  motives  by  which  he  was  swayed,  Newton  had  no 
more  merit  in  discovering  the  law  of  gravitation,  or  inventing  the 
fluxionarv  calculus,  than  the  machine  has  in  following  the  impulse 
given  it ;  nor  is  there  anything  morally  appro vable  in  the  mere 
operation  of  the  instinctive  feelings  and  affections,  such  as  the  love 
of  pleasure,  the  love  of  offspring,  and  the  common  likings  and  at- 
tachments that  exist  in  the  world.  These  may  be  in  the  highest 
degree  becoming,  just  as  proportion,  and  order,  and  beauty  are  be- 
coming ;  but  in  themselves  they  are  neither  virtuous  nor  the  op- 
posite. In  order  that  they  may  become  virtuous,  they  must,  some- 
how or  other,  be  placed  under  the  dominion  of  the  will.  They 
are  vicious  only  so  far  as  they  are  allowed  by  the  will  to  flow  out 
contrary  to  the  dictates  of  that  internal  law  which  God  hath  given 
for  the  regulation  of  the  conduct. 

On  the  other  hand,  there  may  be  virtue  or  vice  wherever  there 
is  will,  and  this  whether  the  will  exist  in  the  form  of  wish,  desire, 
or  volition.  While  we  are  inclined  so  to  limit  the  seat  of  responsi- 
bility as  to  bring  it  within  the  will,  yet  we  would  so  extend  it  as 
to  make  it  wide  as  the  will  in  all  its  exercises.  Accordingly,  we 
cannot  agree  with  those  who,  as  Cousin  and  Jouffroy,  think  that 
no  state  of  the  mind  is  sinful  but  a  positive  volition.  If  we  know 
that  the  object  is  forbidden,  and  still  wish  it,  desire  it,  and  are  only 
prevented  by  certain  prudential  considerations  from  determining 
upon  the  acquisition  of  it,  the  act  is  undoubtedly  sinful.  No 
doubt  if  we  are  prevented,  not  by  mere  prudence,  but  by  a  hatred 
of  sin,  from  seeking  the  attainment  of  the  object,  in  this  case  the 
wish,  the  desire,  is  not  sinful ;  but  then  observe  what  is  the  pre- 
cise nature  of  the  wish  :  it  is  a  wish  to  obtain,  not  the  object  with 
all  its  sinful  concomitants,  but  the  pleasure,  honor,  or  society,  as 
separate  from  the  object.  Now,  in  such  a  wish  or  desire,  there  is 
nothing  improper ;  nay,  there  would  be  nothing  sinful  in  a  posi- 


316  COMMON    QUALITY    OF    VIRTUOUS    ACTION. 

live  volition  which  embraced  no  more.  But  if,  after  knowing  the 
object  to  be  forbidden,  or  that  we  cannot  obtain  it  without  its 
necessary  attendant  sin,  we  still  continue  to  long  for  it,  then  the 
very  wish  and  desire  are  criminal.  "  Whosoever  looketh  on  a 
woman  to  lust  after  her,  hath  committed  adultery  with  her  al- 
ready in  his  heart." 

It  is  at  this  point  that  we  differ  from  Dr.  Chalmers.  Following 
too  implicitly  Dr.  Brown,  whose  lectures  had  just  been  published 
at  the  time  when  the  former  was  called  on  to  write  his  Course  of 
Moral  Philosophy,  he  has  confounded  the  will  in  some  of  its  exer- 
cises with  mere  sensibility.  Not  that  he  has  allowed  his  penetrat- 
ing eye  to  be  completely  dazzled  by  the  brilliant  coruscations  of 
the  ingenious  speculator  referred  to.  A  lingering  attachment  to 
Dr.  Thomas  Reid,  at  a  time  when  he  was  decried  in  Scotland, 
and  a  high  sense  of  moral  principle  as  distinguished  from  mere 
emotion,  has  saved  him  from  adopting  all  the  views  of  the  singu- 
larly subtle  analyst  whom  he  so  much  admired.  In  particular, 
we  find  him  distinguishing  volition  from  mere  desire,  which  latter 
he  represents  as  a  mere  emotion,  with  nothing  in  it  either  virtuous 
or  the  opposite.  Dr.  Brown  has  altogether  confounded  the  will 
and  the  emotions,  and,  so  far  as  we  can  see,  has  virtually  blotted 
the  former  out  of  his  map  of  the  mind  altogether,  at  least  as  a  sep- 
arate territory.  Dr.  Chalmers  has  hurried  in  to  snatch  volition, 
or  the  final  resolution  to  act,  from  the  list  of  mere  emotions,  and 
to  place  it  by  itself  as  a  separate  mental  operation.  We  are 
inclined  to  think  that  he  should  have  gone  farther,  and  taken 
from  the  mere  emotions  not  only  positive  volition,  but  wish  and 
desire,  and  place  the  whole  in  a  separate  department  of  the 
human  mind,  the  region  of  the  will,  which  is  the  seat  of  respon- 
sibility. 

Regarding  all  virtue  and  vice  as  lying  within  the  territory  of 
the  will,  that  is  of  the  mind  exercised  voluntarily  or  optatively,  we 
maintain,  at  the  same  time,  that  their  territory  is  wide  as  that  of 
the  will,  and  that  wishes,  desires,  volitions,  are  all  capable  of 
being  morally  praiseworthy  or  blameworthy.  Not  that  the  will 
in  every  possible  state  is  necessarily  either  virtuous  or  vicious ; 
for  the  wiV  may  be  set  on  an  indifferent  object,  and  neither  be  the 
one  or  other  in  some  of  its  exercises.  What  we  mean  is,  that  the 
will  in  all  its  forms,  whether  of  wish,  desire,  or  volition,  is  capable 
of  being  virtuous  if  properly  directed,  and  of  being  sinful  if  im- 
properly exercised.  Let  us  now  look  at  some  of  the  acknowl 


COMMON    Q.UALITY    OF    VIRTUOUS    ACTION.  317 

edged  virtues,  and  inquire  if  they  do  not  lie  in  this  region  of 
the  soul. 

It  is  universally  admitted  that  love  or  benevolence  must  ever  be 
placed  among  the  highest  of  the  virtues ;  nay,  some  have  main- 
tained that  it  constitutes  virtue.  But  in  ranking  benevolence 
among  the  virtues,  it  is  necessary  to  draw  a  distinction.  Dr. 
Brown  says,  very  properly,  that  "  the  analysis  of  love  presents  us 
with  two  elements,  a  vivid  delight  in  the  contemplation  of  the 
object  of  affection,  and  a  desire  of  good  to  that  object."  *  Now, 
we  do  regard  it  as  of  vast  moment  to  separate  these  two  elements. 
The  one  may  exist,  and  often  does  exist,  without  the  other. 
There  is  often,  on  the  one  hand,  the  delight  in  the  object,  the  sel- 
fish delight,  without  the  desire  of  good,  and  there  may,  in  virtuous 
minds,  be  the  desire  of  good  to  persons  in  whom  no  special  delight 
is  felt.  The  two,  though  often  associated,  proceed  from  essentially 
different  departments  of  the  human  mind.  The  first  is  merely 
emotional,  and,  except  in  so  far  as  it  is  used  or  abused  by  the 
voluntary  powers,  there  is  nothing  in  it  virtuous  or  the  reverse. 
But  when  there  is  a  desire  of  good,  a  simple,  disinterested  desire 
of  good,  there  is  a  more  active  and  positive  state  of  mind ;  we 
have  mounted  to  the  region  of  a  higher  faculty,  and  may  find 
virtue,  and  virtue  of  the  highest  order.  But  there  can,  we  main- 
tain, be  virtue  in  love  or  benevolence  only  so  far  as  it  rises  above 
mere  instinctive  attachment  and  emotional  delight,  and  contains  a 
positive  exercise  of  the  will. 

But  the  field  of  possible  virtue  and  vice  is  wide  as  the  domain 
of  the  will.  Virtue  may  consist  of  other  mental  affections  besides 
mere  benevolence. 

One  of  its  most  essential  forms  is  justice,  or  a  wish,  a  determi- 
nation to  do  what  is  right,  and  give  to  all  their  due.  Justitia  est 
constans  et  perpetua  VOLUNTAS  suum  cuique  tribuendi.  This 
virtue  certainly  comes  within  the  department  of  the  will,  but  can- 
not, with  any  propriety,  be  classed  under  benevolence. 

Virtue  is  in  one  of  its  highest  forms,  or  rather  in  its  highest 
form,  when  the  will  is  properly  exercised  in  reference  to  the  Divine 
Being.  It  is  something  higher  than  mere  benevolence  when  thus 
directed  towards  so  elevated  an  object.  We  feel  that  God  does 
not  need  our  good  wishes,  as  he  does  not  need  our  help ;  and  yet 
we  feel  that  there  is  a  holy  exercise  of  the  will  due  on  our  part  to 
him.  Hence  arises  the  desire  to  glorify  God,  being  the  highest 

*  Lect.  59. 


318  COMMON   QUALITY   OP   VIRTUOUS   ACTION. 

desire  which  the  creature  can  cherish,  and  the  noblest  motive  by 
which  he  can  be  actuated.  This  internal  exercise  of  the  will 
finds  its  fullest  and  most  appropriate  embodiment  and  expression 
in  praise  and  prayer.  Under  this  feeling  we  say,  "  Hallowed  be 
thy  name,"  and  earnestly  long  that  God,  as  he  is  all-glorious,  may 
be  glorified  as  he  ought.  We  say,  "  Thy  will  be  done,"  and  feel 
it  to  be  the  highest  work  in  which  we  can  engage  to  do  his  will, 
and  labor  that  others  also  may  know  it,  and  do  it. 

Taking  this  theory  with  us,  we  see  how  there  may  be  virtue, 
not  only  in  well-wishing,  but  in  the  opposite  of  well-wishing ;  how 
there  may  be  virtuousness  in  the  voluntary  aversion  to  sin,  being 
the  converse  of  the  voluntary  love  to  what  is  good.  In  all  holy 
minds,  as  an  essential  part  of  holiness,  there  is  an  intense  desire 
that  sin  may  not  exist,  and  that  sin,  when  it  exists,  may  not  pros- 
per, but  be  driven  into  perpetual  darkness.* 

But  the  will  is  not  the  only  element.     There  is  a 

SECOND  ELEMENT.  Analyze  and  simplify  as  we  may,  we  can- 
not do  away  with  the  element  of  a  moral  faculty  with  a  rule  of 
action,  that  is,  a  moral  law.  In  all  our  decompositions  we  come 
back  to  this  great  ultimate  fact,  and  cannot  go  beyond  it.  We 
find  this  moral  law  as  an  ultimate  fact  in  the  human  mind,  and 
believe  it  to  represent  an  ultimate  fact  in  the  Divine  mind.  We 
can  follow  it  to  this  its  ultimate  seat  on  the  earth  in  the  constitu- 
tion of  the  human  soul,  and  thence  trace  it  up  to  its  last  seat  in 
heaven  in  the  very  nature  of  God.  We  can  trace  it  thus  far,  and 
it  can  be  traced  no  farther.  Nor  do  we  feel  it  needful  to  discover 
for  it — as  Cousin  and  his  followers  try — any  external  and  objective 
existence  ;  for  this  truth  is  a  truth  of  mind  and  not  of  matter,  and 
of  real  existences  we  know  nothing  except  existences  belonging 
to  mind  or  to  matter.  Having  discovered  the  reality  of  this  fact, 
and  of  its  being  an  ultimate  fact  in  the  world  of  mind,  we  should 
remain  satisfied — indeed,  we  must  remain  satisfied  whether  we 
will  or  no. 

This  second  element  is  admitted  by  moralists  who  have  not  dis- 
covered the  relation,  as  we  have  now  endeavored  to  point  it  out, 

*  Dr.  Chalmers  says  (Mor.  Phil.  v.  6,  note]  that  desire  respects  the  objects  wished, 
and  volition  the  action  by  which  the  object  is  attained;  and  (v.  16)  that  volition 
alone  is  the  proper  object,  of  moral  censure  or  approbation.  We  regard  desire  in 
actively  longing  for  the  object  wished  (as  benevolence,  for  instance),  and  also  the 
voluntary  hatreds  (as  the  hatred  of  sin),  as  all  capable  of  being  moral  or  immoral,  as 
well  as  the  volition. 


COMMON    QUALITY    OF    VIRTUOUS    ACTION.  319 

between  it  and  the  first  element.  "  For  a  thing  to  be  done  virtu- 
ously, it  must  be  done  voluntarily  ;  but  this  is  not  enough,  it  is  not 
all.  It  is  an  indispensable  condition,  but  not  the  only  con- 
dition. The  other  condition — that  to  be  done  virtuously  it  must 
be  done  because  of  its  virtuousness,  or  its  virtuousness  must 
be  the  prompting  consideration,  which  led  to  the  doing  of 
it.  It  is  not  volition  alone  which  makes  a  thing  virtuous,  but 
a  volition  under  a  sense  of  duty,  and  that  only  is  a  moral 
performance  to  which  a  man  is  urged  by  the  sense  or  feeling 
of  moral  obligation.  It  may  be  done  at  the  bidding  of  incli- 
nation, but  without  this  it  is  not  done  at  the  bidding  of  principle. 
Without  this  it  is  not  virtuous."  * 

It  is  not,  then, .mere  well-wishing,  mere  benevolence,  or  affection 
considered  even  as  an  act  of  the  will,  which  constitutes  virtue. 
The  affection  shown  by  the  ancient  Egyptians  and  modern  Indiana 
towards  cats  and  other  species  of  the  lower  animals,  cannot  be  re- 
garded as  meritorious ;  nor  could  any  extent  of  that  affection, 
though  it  should  lead  to  the  founding  of  an  hospital  for  their  be- 
hoof, come  up  to  the  morally  commendable.  Yet  we  suspect  that 
much  of  the  benevolence  that  exists  in  the  world,  and  which  is  so 
applauded  by  it,  is  of  no  higher  a  nature,  and  cannot  be  regarded 
as  virtuous  because  it  is  destitute  of  one  essential  moral  quality. 
It  is  only  when  we  are  kind  to  the  lower  animals  from  a  higher 
principle,  and  exercise  benevolence  towards  mankind,  because  this 
is  right,  that  our  love  becomes  morally  commendable. 

Taking  this  principle  along  with  us,  we  see  how  it  is  perfectly 
possible  that  there  may  be  numerous  good  wishes,  and  fervent 
benevolent  desires,  in  which  there  is  no  virtue,  but  rather  much 
sin.  There  may  be  much  evil  in  ill-regulated  benevolent  desires 
and  volitions.  Neither  the  existence  nor  the  fervor  of  such  desires 
can  prove  the  mind  in  which  they  exist  to  be  in  a  morally  right 
condition.  The  most  wicked  of  men  have  not  been  without  their 
feelings  of  benevolence,  and  some  of  them  have  shown  their 
wickedness  in  the  nature  and  character  of  their  benevolence. 
These  feelings,  and  the  corresponding  actions,  can  become  morally 
commendable  only  when  cherished  or  done  because  they  are 
right. 

In  summing  up  the  truth  which  we  have  gained,  it  appears  that 
God  the  governor  has  given  to  every  responsible  agent  a  transcript 
of  his  own  nature,  first,  in  a  power  of  will  which  we  hold  to  be  as 

*  Chalmers'  Mor.  Phil,  c.  v. 


'320  COMMON    QUALITY    OF    VIRTUOUS    ACTION. 

free  as  it  is  possible  for  it  to  be  in  any  intelligible  sense  of  the  term  ; 
and  secondly,  and  alongside  of  this  free  will,  a  fixed  law  for  the 
guidance  of  the  will.  Freedom  and  law  are  thus  the  fundamental 
charters  of  this  kingdom  of  mind.  The  mind  is  virtuous  when 
the  two  are  in  union,  when  the  free  will  is  moving  in  accordance 
with  the  fixed  law.  The  mind  is  criminal  when  the  free  will  is 
unfaithful  to  her  partner  and  husband  the  law.  There  begin  from 
that  instant  that  schism,  those  family  dissensions,  if  we  may  so 
speak,  which  do  so  distract  the  soul.  And  from  these  inward  con- 
tests there  can  be  no  escape  by  means  of  a  lawful  divorce.  That 
fixed  law  still  holds  forth  its  ctaims,  and  stands  by  its  rights,  which 
it  will  not,  and  cannot  forego,  nor  even  lower  by  a  single  iota. 
Hence  that  internal  dissension  which  rages  in  the  breasts  of  all 
whose  will  has  rebelled  against  the  law  of  their  nature,  that  is, 
the  law  of  God — a  schism  which,  but  for  Divine  interposition, 
must  exist  for  ever,  it  being  impossible  for  the  distracted  parties 
either  to  separate  on  the  one  hand,  or  cordially  to  unite  on  the 
other. 

The  truly  good,  then,  cannot  exist  without  the  presence  both 
of  righteousness  and  benevolence  or  love.  There  is  benevolence 
in  every  right  exercise  of  justice.  Justice  is  love  leading  us  to 
give  every  one  his  due.  There  is  righteousness,  too,  in  every  right 
exercise  of  love.  A  holy  love  is  love  cherished  toward  being  ac- 
cording as  that  being  has  a  claim  upon  it.  No  analysis  can  free 
us  from  the  one  or  other  of  these  essential  elements.  Justice 
without  love  would  be  a  mere  rule,  with  nothing  to  impel  the 
agent  to  perform  it.  Love  without  justice  is  the  mere  lavishing 
of  a  weak  affection.  The  two  meet  and  blend  in  every  act  that 
is  morally  right,  as  they  meet  in  the  character  of  every  holy 
creature,  and  in  the  character  of  the  holy  Creator. 

All  deep  and  earnest  inquirers  into  the  nature  of  virtue  have 
got  at  least  a  partial  view  of  the  complex  truth.  Each  has  seen 
it  under  one  aspect,  and  has  gone  away  so  ravished  with  the  sight, 
that  he  never  thought  of  going  round  the  object  and  inquiring  if 
it  had  another  aspect  equally  lovely.  Hutcheson  is  right  in  saying, 
that  in  all  virtue  there  is  benevolence ;  and  Edwards  has  given 
his  theory  a  wider  expansion  in  affirming  that  love  to  being  is  of 
the  very  essence  of  virtuous  action.  Clarke,  too,  enunciates  a 
profound  truth  when  he  says,  that  there  is  an  eternal  fitness  in 
virtue,  for  there  is  such  a  fitness  in  that  righteousness  which  regu- 
lates benevolence.  Reid,  and  Stewart,  and  Cousin,  have  developed 


COMMON    Q.UALITY    OF    VIRTUOUS    ACTION.  321 

the' mental  process  by  which  this  eternal  fitness  is  discovered,  and 
have  shown,  too,  that  virtue  must  reside  in  the  will.  Each  has 
seen  so  much  of  the  truth.  To  use  an  image  of  Jouffroy,  each 
has  seen  one  side  of  the  pyramid,  and  has  written  beneath  it — not. 
as  he  ought,  this  is  one.  side  of  the  pyramid,  but  this  is  the  pyra- 
mid. One  party  has  seen  the  love,  and  another  has  seen  the 
righteousness.  Hutcheson  observed  that  affection  and  feeling 
were  essential  parts  of  all  virtue,  but  took  no  cognizance  of  the 
fixed  principles  by  which  they  must  be  regulated.  Edwards,  in  a 
profounder  investigation,  discovered  that  love  must  be  according 
to  a  rule ;  but  he  did  not  follow  out  his  investigations  so  far  as  to 
discover  the  fundamental  nature  of  that  rule,  as  being  no  less 
essential  a  part  of  morality  than  love  itself.  Clarke  and  Cud- 
worth,  with  clear  intellectual  intuition,  saw  the  presence  of  eternal 
and  unresolvable  principles.  Reid  and  his  followers  have  patiently 
investigated  the  powers  of  the  human  mind  by  which  these  prin- 
ciples are  discovered ;  but  none  of  these  latter  philosophers  seem 
to  give  its  proper  place  to  the  no  less  important  element  of  benevo- 
lence. The  true  theory  is  to  be  found,  not  in  the  indiscriminate, 
not  in  the  mere  mechanical  combination  of  the  two,  but  in  their 
chemical  combination,  in  the  melting  and  fusing  of  them  into 
one. 

Justice  and  love  are  the  compliment,  the  one  of  the  other.  Let 
us  not  separate  the  things  that  are  indissolubly  joined  together  in 
this  holy  covenant.  Let  righteousness  stand  for  ever  on  the  ped- 
estal on  which  he  has  been  set  up,  with  his  high  look  and  un- 
bending mien,  the  master  and  the  guardian  •  and  ever  beside  him, 
beneath  him,  and  leaning  upon  him,  and  yet  tall  and  graceful  as 
he,  let  there  be  seen  that  love  with  smiles  upon  her  face,  and  gifts 
in  her  hands.  Our  eye  would  at  times  rest  most  fondly  on  the 
latter  ;  but  then  we  are  constrained  to  acknowledge,  that  were  the 
latter  left  alone  there  would  be  no  principle  of  discernment  for  her 
guidance,  and  so  we  look  eagerly  to  the  other  as  the  ground  of 
our  lasting  confidence  and  security. 

These  considerations  may  help  us  to  understand  the  relation 
between  love  on  the  one  hand,  and  righteousness  on  the  other,  the 
former  being  the  impellent  of  virtue,  and  the  latter  the  rule.  The 
two  are  not  antagonist,  but  conspiring.  In  the  Divine  character, 
and  in  all  holy  character,  the  two  are  in  closest  and  loveliest  union. 
Love,  ever  ready  to  flow  out  like  the  waters  from  a  fountain,  has 
unchanging  justice  standing  at  its  side,  and  determining  its  meas- 

21 


322  COMMON    QUALITY    OF    VIRTUOUS    ACTION. 

ure  and  direction,  and  furnishing  it  with  a  channel  in  which  to 
flow. 

Let  us  now  contemplate  the  soul  of  the  agent  whose  will  is  act- 
ing in  unison  with  the  moral  law.  Taking  will  in  the  enlarged 
sense  in  which  we  have  been  contemplating  it,  it  must,  from  its 
very  nature  and  position,  exercise  a  powerful  influence  upon  the 
intellect  and  the  affections.  In  a  well-regulated  mind,  that  is  a 
mind  thoroughly  guided  by  the  moral  faculty,  the  very  intellect 
becomes  virtuous,  in  a  sense,  in  all  its  exercises,  because  ever  re- 
strained on  the  one  hand,  and  quickened  on  the  other,  by  a  holy 
will.  In  such  a  mind,  too,  the* sensibility  raised  by  mental  appre- 
hension or  conception  will,  like  the  mental  apprehension  and  con- 
ception which  raises  it,  be  thoroughly  sanctified,  and  become  the 
first  reward  which  virtue  reaps. 

We  are  deeply  impressed,  indeed,  with  the  importance  of  draw- 
ing the  distinction  between  the  will  and  the  emotions.  There  un- 
doubtedly exist  emotional  delight  and  attachment  quite  separate 
from  the  will ;  but  it  is  perfectly  consistent  with  this  to  maintain, 
that  if  the  will  be  right  it  will  keep  the  whole  affections  right 
likewise. 

In  love,  using  the  term  in  its  highest  sense,  the  main  element 
is  the  will.  The  will  declares  that  this  object,  this  person,  is  good, 
is  to  be  preferred  and  chosen,  and  wishes  well  to  that  object  or 
person  ;  and  these  we  regard  as  the  important  constituents  of  true 
affection.  Take,  as  an  example,  love  to  God.  Here  the  will,  in 
the  first  instance,  fixes  on  the  Divine  excellence,  and  would  choose 
it ;  and  here,  too,  the  will  leads  us  to  desire  God's  glory,  and  the 
furtherance  of  his  will.  Or  take  love  to  man — disinterested  love 
to  man.  Here,  too,  the  will  leads  us  to  fix  on  living  being  in  gen- 
eral, and  such  a  being  as  man  in  particular,  as  an  object  to  be 
chosen  by  us,  and  to  wish  well  to  him,  and  endeavor  to  promote 
his  happiness. 

While  we  regard  the  will  as  the  main  element  in  love,  we  know, 
at  the  same  time,  that  there  are  emotions  so  far  following  separate 
laws ;  but  we  maintain,  that  if  the  will  be  stedfast  and  consistent, 
it  will  draw  the  feelings  after  it,  and  come  to  guide  them  all.  We 
are  quite  aware  that  a  mere  act  of  the  conscience,  saying  that  such 
and  such  an  act  ought  to  be  done,  but  in  no  way  attended  to  by 
the  will,  will  not  accomplish  such  a  result ;  nor  will  such  effects 
follow  from  a  mere  decision  of  the  judgment,  that  if  we  do  such 
and  such  an  act  beneficial  consequences  will  follow.  It  is  of  the 


COMMON    QUALITY    OP    VIRTUOUS    ACTION.  323 

power  of  the  will  that  we  are  predicating  that  it  can  accomplish 
these  important  ends.  Nor  will  a  single  act  of  the  will,  or  a  single 
wish  or  determination  in  opposition  to  the  will  generally  set  in  an 
opposite  direction,  change  and  direct  the  whole  current  of  the  feel- 
ing. The  wicked  man  wonders  that  he  cannot  love  what  is  good 
on  his  making  a  momentary  resolution  to  do  so.  Truly,  if  a  mere 
passing  desire  to  do  good  could  make  a  man  good,  there  is  perhaps 
no  wicked  man  upon  the  earth  who  would  not  have  been  good 
long  ere  now  $  for  we  doubt  if  there  be  any  man  so  depraved  that 
he  has  not  at  times  had  a  desire  to  change  his  mode  of  life.  But 
it  would  be  wonderful  if,  with  a  will  so  habitually  depraved,  the 
wicked  man  could  be  so  easily  led  to  love  what  is  good.  He  wills 
at  this  present  time  to  secure  the  good,  but  next  instant  he  delib- 
erately prefers  the  evil.  When  the  will  is  wavering  and  inconsis- 
tent the  sensibility  will  come  to  follow  its  own  impulses  as  it  does 
in  every  ill-regulated  mind.  When  the  will  prefers  the  evil,  and 
then  takes  steps  to  paint  the  evil  in  false  colors  in  order  to  awaken 
the  feeling,  the  perverted  feeling  will  become  the  most  unequivocal 
sign,  and  one  of  the  most  fearful  punishments  of  a  corrupted  will. 
Should  the  will,  on  the  other  hand,  steadily  prefer  the  morally 
good,  and  take  pains  to  have  it  ever  presented  to  the  mind  in  its 
proper  colors,  it  will  speedily  lead  the  feelings  whithersoever  it  will, 
and  this  will  always  be  towards  that  which  is  holy  and  good. 

Let  but  this  rudder  of  the  mind  be  rightly  used,  and  it  will 
speedily  guide  the  whole  vessel — the  whole  soul,  intellect,  and  emo- 
tions— in  the  right  way,  allowing  these,  meanwhile,  to  perform  all 
their  proper  functions.  How  grand,  how  delicately  sensitive  would 
be  a  soul  so  regulated  !  It  might  be  said  of  it,  as  Cowper  said  of 
the  ocean, — 

Vast  as  it  is,  it  answers  as  it  flows 

The  breathing  of  the  lightest  air  that  blows. 

But  it  may  be  proper,  before  leaving  this  subject,  to  add,  that 
besides  the  specific  question, — What  is  a  virtuous  act?  there  is  a 
more  general  question,  into  which  the  other  resolves  itself — What 
constitutes  a  virtuous  agent  ?  The  answer  is,  an  agent  in  whom 
the  moral  faculty  or  law  has  its  proper  place  and  power,  ruling 
over  all,  and  subordinating  the  will  as  the  active  principle.  The 
human  mind  is  a  unity,  and  it  is  impossible  to  separate  the  acts, 
in  regard  to  their  responsibility,  from  the  agent  who  performs  them. 
It  is  not  the  act  which  must  bear  the  responsibility,  but  the  agent 


324 


PRACTICAL    RULE    TO    BE    FOLLOWED 


who  does  the  act.  God  judges  not  so  much  the  acts  as  the  agent 
in  the  acts.  If  the  actor  be  not  in  a  virtuous  state — if  his  will  be 
not  in  subjection  to  the  law  appointed  to  rule  it — it  is  not  possible 
that  he  can  be  virtuous.  The  conscience  will  not  justify  him,  arid 
we  may  conclude  that  the  God  in  whose  name  the  conscience 
speaks  will  condemn  him. 

These  considerations  lead  to  the  conclusion,  that  an  agent  in  a 
virtuous  state,  and  no  other,  can  perform  a  virtuous  action.  It  is 
not  enough  to  consider  the  isolated  act,  we  must  consider  likewise 
the  agent  in  the  act  before  we  can  pronounce  it  to  be  either  virtu- 
ous or  vicious.  We  hold  this  principle  to  be  one  of  vast  moment 
both  in  ethics  and  theology,  and  we  may  return  to  the  considera- 
tion of  it  when  we  come  to  consider  the  existing  moral  state  of 
man. 

SECTION  VI.-PRACTICAL  RULE  TO  BE  FOLLOWED  IN  DETERMINING 
WHAT  IS  GOOD  AND  EVIL. 

All  who  have  made  ethics  a  subject  of  study  must  know  how 
perilous  it  is  to  found  virtue  on  the  will  of  God.  An  action  is 
holy  not  because  God  wills  it,  but  he  wills  it  because  it  is  holy. 
The  person  who  reverses  this  maxim  may  intend  to  benefit  the 
cause  of  religion,  but  in  reality  he  is  doing  it  serious  damage. 

We  found  virtue  not  on  the  mere  will  of  God,  but  on  his  holy 
will,  his  will  regulated  by  righteousness,  an  attribute  as  essential 
to  him  as  his  will.  The  conscience  in  man  is  the  representative 
of  this,  the  holy  will  of  his  Governor. 

To  man,  as  shut  out  from  supernatural  revelation,  this  law  in 
the  heart  is  the  ultimate  arbiter.  They  who  have  no  written  law- 
are  a  law  unto  themselves. 

But  the  existence  of  this  law  in  the  heart  does  not  render  a 
written  law  useless  or  unnecessary.  Even  to  beings  perfectly 
pure  God  may  find  it  proper  to  reveal  precepts  additional  to  those 
announced  by  the  conscience,  as  when  he  required  our  first  pa- 
rents not  to  eat  of  a  particular  tree.  And  should  the  mind  and 
conscience  become  defiled,  as  we  shall  show  that  they  are  in  the 
succeeding  chapter,  a  written  law  is  required  for  its  rectification 
as  much  as  a  dial  is  in  order  to  correct  a  disordered  time-piece. 

Nor  can  this  written  law  ever  supersede  the  law  in  the  heart, 
On  the  contrary,  it  ever  pre-supposes  it,  and  is  specially  addressed 
to  it.  For,  why  are  we  bound  to  obey  that  written  law  ?  Plainly 
because  of  the  law  written  hi  the  heart,  which  declares  that  this 


DETERMINING    WHAT    IS    GOOD    AND   EVIL.  325 

:is  right.  Or4f  some  one  asserts  that  we  are  rather  bound  to  obey 
it  because  it  is  the  will  of  God,  we  follow  him  with  the  farther 
question, — Why  are  we  bound  to  obey  the  will  of  God  1  And  his 
answer  must  bring  us  back  to  the  law  in  the  heart,  declaring  that 
this  is  right. 

This  practical  rule  of  obedience,  then,  is  the  law  written  in  the 
heart,  to  those  who  have  no  supernatural  revelation,  and  the  writ- 
ten law  as  addressed  to  the  conscience,  to  those  who  are  in  posses- 
sion of  revelation. 

When  we  have  a  law  truly  revealed  from  heaven,  the  con- 
science itself  declares  that  we  should  study  and  obey  it,  and  obey 
it  as  the  law  of  God  our  Governor.  God  has  thus  in  the  law  of 
the  heart  a  means  of  making  us  feel  our  obligation  to  obey  every 
other  law,  moral  or  positive,  which  he  may  superadd. 

While  virtue  consists  in  a  willing  obedience  to  moral  law,  it  is 
implied  that  what  we  obey  is  truly  moral  law.  We  must  be  at 
pains  to  inquire  whether  what  we  take  to  be  law  be  really  moral 
law,  or  the  mere  semblance  of  it.  The  greatest,  evils  have  sprung 
from  mistakes  on  this  subject,  and  from  misinterpreting,  under  the 
influence  of  sinful  bias,  the  law  of  heaven,  whether  in  the  con- 
science or  in  the  word.  The  law  itself  requires  that  we  use  all 
means  to  determine  what  is  really  the  will  of  heaven  on  such 
and  such  a  subject,  and  that  we  do  not  mistake  the  voice  of  inclina- 
tion for  the  voice  of  duty,  or  the  voice  of  man  for  the  voice  of  God. 

It  is  one  of  the  most  beneficent  of  the  effects  of  the  law  of  God 
written  in  the  Bible  that  it  rectifies  the  law  of  conscience,  which 
has  become  -deranged,  and  bewildered  in  its  derangement,  and 
so  needs  a  hand  to  guide  it  back  to  its  right  position.  It  is  ano- 
ther of  its  beneficent  effects,  that  being  used  as  an  instrument 
for  this  purpose  by  a  higher  power,  it  restores  to  the  conscience 
its  primitive  discernment  and  sensibility,  and  it  becomes  a  con- 
stant monitor  against  evil,  and  a  means  of  prompting  to  all  ex- 
cellence. 

SECTION  VII— TENDENCY  OF  VIRTUOUS  ACTION. 

We  have  endeavored  to  show  that  there  is  a  holy  quality  in 
virtuous  action  itself,  separate  from  its  tendency  or  results ;  and 
that  the  human  mind  is  led  by  its  very  nature  and  constitution  to 
commend  that  quality  and  disapprove  of  the  opposite,  indepen- 
dent of  the  consequences  which  may  follow  from  one  or  the  other. 
Sut  while  the  intuitions,  whether  of  reason  or  conscience,  are  an- 


326 


TENDENCY    OF    VIRTUOUS    ACTION. 


terior  to  all  experience  and  observation,  yet  these  latter  are  con- 
tinually furnishing  corroboration  of  the  reality  of  intuitive  prin- 
ciples. The  mind,  for  instance,  proceeding  on  a  certain  instinct 
of  thought,  expects  the  same  causes  to  be  always  followed  by  the 
same  effects,  and  it  finds  actual  nature  fulfilling  its  anticipations. 
Without  such  a  correspondence  between  the  internal  organization 
of  the  mind  and  the  actual  phenomena  of  the  external  world,  man 
would  be  in  a  constant  state  of  amazement  and  fear.  There  are 
also  confirmations  (in  many  respects  similar,  though  in  others  dif- 
ferent) of  the  reality  and  beauty  of  the  moral  law  constantly  sup- 
plied by  the  arrangements  of  God.  It  is  a  most  delightful  corrob- 
oration of  the  intuitive  principle  and  feeling  which  is  furnished 
by  the  discovery  of  the  fact,  that  all  virtuous  exercises  are  imme- 
diately followed  by  pleasant  sensations  in  the  breast  of  the  virtu- 
ous agent,  and  ultimately  tend  to  further  the  best  interests  of 
society. 

The  phenomena  to  which  our  attention  is  now  called  are  of  a 
twofold  character.  There  are  the  internal  and  the  external 
correspondence.  There  are  the  pleasurable  emotions  that  accom- 
pany the  cherishing  of  virtuous  affection  ;  and  there  are  also  the 
advantages  accruing  to  society  from  the  performance  of  virtuous 
action. 

These  consequences  are  not  individual  or  isolated,  but  are 
rather  of  the  nature  of  classes  or  groups. 

There  is,  first,  the  pleasant  sensation  that  pervades  the  mind 
when  it  is  cherishing  virtuous  affection.  In  all  virtuous  affection 
there  is  love,  and  this  affection  in  itself  furnishes  delight.  It  is  a 
pleasure  far  higher  and  deeper  than  any  which  can  be  obtained 
from  mere  animal  gratification.  On  the  other  hand,  all  sinful  af- 
fections, such  as  envy,  malice,  and  revenge,  are  painful  in  them- 
selves, and  a  deep  spring  of  misery,  independently  of  any  visible 
judgments  which  they  may  bring  in  their  train. 

Then  there  are,  secondly,  the  pleasurable  emotions  which 
spring  up  on  the  contemplation  of  virtuous  action  as  performed 
by  us.  This  is  a  pleasure  distinct  from,  and  additional  to,  the 
former.  There  is  a  pleasure  in  the  very  cherishing  of  the  virtu- 
ous affection,  and  there  is  a  pleasure  in  the  sentiment  raised  when 
the  moral  faculty  looks  at  these  affections.  The  mind  is  in  a  state 
of  pleasurable  emotion  when  it  is  virtuously  employed;  and  the 
mind  is  also  in  a  state  of  pleasurable  emotion  when  it  reviews  its 
own  virtuous  affections.  There  are  not  only,  for  instance,  the 


TENDENCY    OF    VIRTUOUS    ACTION.  327 

delightful  sensations  produced  by  holy  love,  but  there  are  also  the 
delightful  sensations  of  moral  approbation  which  rise  up  on  the 
reflex  contemplation  of  such  affection.  In  this  respect  virtuous 
affection  has  an  advantage  over  every  other.  There  are  many 
other  affections  of  the  mind  that  are  pleasurable  in  themselves, 
such  as  the  desire  of  pleasure,  and  the  sense  of  beauty,  but  none 
others  that  have  their  pleasure  indefinitely  multiplied  by  emotions 
which  rise  when  these  affections  are  reflexly  contemplated.  In 
other  cases,  the  pleasure  can  be  prolonged  only  by  calling  up 
anew  the  affection  in  its  positive  exercise,  which  it  may  not 
always  be  possible  to  do.  In  this  case,  while  the  delightful  sensa- 
tion can  be  renewed  by  the  renewed  cherishing  of  the  affection,  a 
new  and  equally  delightful  feeling  is  called  forth  by  the  very  medi- 
tation upon  the  affection.  The  virtuous  man  has  thus  the  double 
pleasure,  somewhat  resembling  the  twofold  sensation  enjoyed  by 
those  animals  which  first  enjoy  the  pleasure  of  eating  their  food, 
and  then  as  they  recline  at  ease,  the  pleasure  of  chewing  it  a 
second  time.  Or  to  adopt  an  image  which  comes  nearer  the  re- 
ality, (in  so  far  as  the  secondary  pleasure  is  one  which  can  be  many 
times  repeated,)  the  pleasant  sound  which  the  soul  utters  to  its 
God,  when  it  is  virtuously  employed,  can  be  indefinitely  prolonged 
by  reverberation  from  the  heights  of  the  moral  faculty  and  the 
echoing  responses  of  the  moral  feelings. 

There  is  a  similar  multiplying  of  the  pain  which  follows 
vicious  action.  All  the  malign  affections  are  painful  in  them- 
selves, and  painful  also  in  the  recollection  of  them,  and  they  are 
painful  because  the  mind  abhors  them.  The  misery  of  the  soul 
is  immeasurably  increased  by  the  regurgitation  of  feelings  as  they 
are  beat  back  by  a  reproaching  conscience. 

There  is,  thirdly,  the  effect  of  virtuous  and  vicious  affection 
upon  the  association  of  ideas.  This  is  a  view  which  has  not  been 
sufficiently  noticed  by  moralists.  It  is  foreign  to  our  present  pur- 
pose to  enter  into  any  particular  explanation  of  the  phenomenon. 
The  fact  will  not  be  disputed  by  any  who  are  at  the  trouble  to 
remember  how  soothing  they  have  felt  the  influence  of  affection, 
and  how  harassing  the  movements  of  sinful  passion.  It  is  evi- 
dent that  virtue  possesses  a  power  of  calling  up  a  whole  train  of 
pleasing  thoughts  and  feelings,  and  that  vicious  action  has  an 
equally  powerful  influence  in  leading  away  the  mind  into  an  op- 
posite channel,  where  it  meets  with  everything  that  is  disturbing 
and  distressing.  The  stream  raises  along  its  banks  a  stripe  of 


328  TENDENCY    OF    VIRTUOUS    ACTION. 

verdure,  composed  of  rich  grass  and  foliage,  or  of  baleful  weeds, 
according  as  its  waters  are  pure  or  impure. 

This  power,  according  to  the  views  above  developed,  is  of  a  two- 
fold kind.  There  is,  first,  the  direct  power  which  benevolent  or 
malevolent  affections  possess  of  calling  up  analogous  affections 
with  all  their  pleasant  or  painful  sensations.  By  this  law  of  asso- 
ciation virtue  and  vice  propagate  themselves  after  their  kind,  and 
the  species  multiplies  itself.  There  is,  secondly,  the  power  of  con- 
science, with  its  train  of  feelings,  as  it  reviews  virtuous  or  vicious 
action.  The  most  delightful  frames  of  which  the  mind  is  suscep- 
tible, are  those  that  are  put  in  motion  by  an  approving  heart.  In 
the  rest  which  a  pacified  conscience  gives,  a  solid  peace  is  raised 
up  to  be  a  constant  companion  and  help-meet  for  us.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  bitterest  feelings  which  agitate  the  human  breast 
are  those  which  follow  in  the  funeral  wake  of  a  condemning  con- 
science. The  pulsations  that  are  thus  set  in  motion  differ  in 
number  and  intensity,  but  they  generally  continue  for  a  time; 
the  waves  now  carrying  forward  the  mind  to  all  that  is  holy  and 
delightful,  and  again  when  evil  casting  it  back  upon  a  waste  and 
barren  shore.  The  delightful  eagerness  and  buoyancy  of  the  vir- 
tuous mind  on  the  one  hand,  as  well  as  the  aching  of  the  vi- 
cious man's  heart  on  the  other,  proceed  very  much  from  this 
cause.  It  will  appear,  in  the  next  chapter,  that  some  of  the 
wicked  man's  most  maddening  struggles  have  arisen  from  a  de- 
sire to  rid  himself  of  this  dreadful  gnawing  of  a  mind  which  is 
not  at  ease. 

Fourthly,  there  is  the  general  influence  of  virtuous  and  vicious 
affection  upon  the  whole  character.  Independently  altogether  of 
the  immediate  emotions  which  follow  virtuous  affection  and  the 
contemplation  of  virtuous  affection,  and  even  of  the  immediate 
trains  of  feeling  that  follow,  it  has  a  general  tendency  to  put  the 
whole  soul  in  a  sound  and  healthy,  and  therefore  in  a  buoyant 
and  pleasant  state.  This  is  the  most  beneficent  of  all  the  effects 
of  virtue.  It  arises  from  those  nice  arrangements  which  God  hath 
instituted  among  the  various  powers  and  laws  of  the  human  mind, 
precisely  analogous  to  those  adjustments  which  we  admire  so 
much  in  the  material  world.  It  is  by  the  skilful  adaptation  of 
these  laws  of  association  and  feeling,  one  to  another,  that  virtuous 
affection  tends  to  produce  a  mind  at  ease  and  happy,  and  habitual 
virtue  produces  a  soul  blessed  in  all  its  moods  and  trains  of  senti- 
ment and  feeling.  Peace,  originating  in  virtue  as  its  source,  is 


TENDENCY    OF    VIRTUOUS    ACTIOM.  329 

made  to  shine  upon  the  soul  from  all  its  faculties  and  feelings,  as 
the  light  which  comes  from  the  sun  reflected  from  and  refracted 
in  the  atmosphere,  shines  upon  the  earth  from  every  point,  and  in 
infinitely  diversified  colors.  On  the  other  hand,  the  tendency  of 
vicious  affection  is  to  produce  not  only  the  misery  which  directly 
flows  from  it  emotionally,  and  that  which  springs  from  an  accus- 
ing conscience ;  but  also  to  breed  a  disordered  mind,  wretched  in 
every  one  of  its  trains  of  thought  and  feeling,  and  lashing  itself 
into  greater  and  more  unappeasable  fury. 

Besides  these  internal,  there  are  also  external  pre-ordained  con- 
sequences, flowing  from  virtuous  ar  vicious  action.  These  spring 
from  the  pre-established  harmony  between  the  world  within,  and 
the  world  without.  These  effects,  like  those  contemplated  under  • 
the  former  head,  may  be. divided  into  various  classes,  according  as 
they  follow  immediately  or  more  remotely. 

First,  There  is  the  immediate  effect  of  virtuous  action.  As 
virtue  consists  in  justice  and  benevolence,  and  modifications  of 
them,  it  is  manifest,  that  its  exercises  must  usually  consist  in  the 
multiplication  of  happiness ;  while  the  absence  of  virtue,  and 
much  more  the  existence  of  positive  vice,  must  lead  to  consequences 
precisely  opposite. 

Secondly,  There  is  the  effect  of  virtue  in  producing  confidence, 
and  of  vice  in  spreading  a  spirit  of  distrust  throughout  society. 
Where  there  is  no  internal  confidence,  no  external  bandage  could 
hold  society  pleasantly  together. 

Besides  these  direct  effects,  there  are,  thirdly,  the  general  re- 
sults, good  and  evil,  that  follow  from  virtue  and  vice,  through  the 
arrangements  of  Divine  Providence.  The  success  which  generally 
follows  the  exertions  of  virtue,  and  the  ultimate  failure  of  vice, 
all  attest  that  there  is  a  governor  in  this  world  upholding  his  own 
laws. — If  it  is  urged  as  an  objection,  that  in  many  cases  virtue, 
especially  in  its  higher  and  bolder  forms,  is  not  successful ;  and 
that  vice,  in  many  cases,  is  allowed  to  triumph,  the  answer  is  ob- 
vious. While  good  purposes  may  be  served  by  giving  certain  en- 
couragement to  virtue,  it  does  not  seem  desirable  to  stimulate  a 
mere  artificial  virtue,  by  holding  out  the  certainty  of  success. 
Were  virtue  in  every  case  followed  by  its  merited  triumphs,  there 
would  be  a  risk  that  the  triumph  would  be  more  valued  than  the 
qualities  which  led  to  it.  The  general  countenance  shown  is  suf- 
ficient to  indicate  the  will  of  God ;  and  anything  beyond  might 
be  attended  with  incidental  evils.  It  is  also  conceivable,  that 


330      VIEW  OF  MAN'S  ORIGINAL  MORAL  CONSTITUTION, 

in  a  world  under  probation,  advantage  might  arise  from  not 
exposing  vice  to  instant  failure;  while  in  the  manifold  visible 
judgment  of  heaven,  there  are  sufficient  indications  of  the  Divine 
hatred  of  sin. 


SECTION  VIIL— GENERAL  VIEW  OF  MAN'S  ORIGINAL  MORAL  CONSTI- 
TUTION, AS  ILLUSTRATIVE  OF  THE  CHARACTER  OF  GOD. 

If  there  is  any  truth  in  the  above  remarks,  it  "will  at  once  be 
seen  how  deep  a  foundation  God  has  laid  for  morality  in  man's 
original  constitution.  Moral  excellence  is  truly  the  whole 
powers  and  affections  of  the  soul  in  healthy  exercise  ;  and  in  order 
to  guard  it,  there  is  a  faculty,  with  a  train  of  corresponding  feel- 
ings, presiding  over  all  the  other  faculties,  and  seated  in  the  very 
heart.  Beside  the  original  strength  imparted  to  it,  and  the  lofty 
position  assigned  to  it,  it  has  a  whole  train  of  attendants  that  wait 
upon  it,  to  obey  its  will,  and  to  do  it  honor  in  the  results  which 
flow  from  it.  It  has  this  high  place  assigned  to  it  in  man's  very 
constitution,  which  thus  indicates  the  high  value  which  God  sets 
upon  it;  and  announces,  too,  what  is  the  place  which  we  should 
reserve  for  that  God  whom  it  represents.  It  is  true  that  virtue  has 
no  such  lofty  position  in  man's  present  nature ;  but  still  there  is 
evidence,  in  the  sadly  ruined  building,  that  though  the  tower  so 
battlemented,  turreted,  and  guarded,  has  fallen,  it  was  once  the 
crowning  object  and  defence  of  the  fabric. 

It  has  often  been  disputed,  whether  virtue  has  its  seat  among 
the  faculties  or  the  feelings.  This  controversy  has  not  unfre- 
quently  been  a  mere  war  of  words.  Persons  who  deny  that  it  is 
in  the  intellect,  mean  by  intellect,  simply  the  reason  distinguishing 
between  truth  and  error.  Those  who  deny  that  it  lies  in  the 
feelings,  mean  by  feelings  the  mere  flying  emotions  which  depend 
on  the  temperament  of  the  mind.  When  we  take  a  full  view,  we 
may  discover  both  the  exercise  of  a  faculty  and  the  play  of  feel- 
ing. In  virtuous  action,  all  the  parts  of  the  soul,  and  not  merely 
one  department  of  it,  are  called  forth  into  vigorous  exertion. 
There  is  the  will  followed  by  the  sensibility,  subordinated  to  the 
moral  faculty,  quickened  by  its  appropriate  emotion,  and  guiding 
the  whole  intellectual  powers.  It  is  the  united  anthem  of  praise, 
offered  by  every  part  of  the  human  soul  to  God,  its  governor  and 
its  king. 

When  the  reflex  moral  faculty,  or  the  conscience,  surveys  vir- 


AS    ILLUSTRATIVE    OF    THE    CHARACTER    OP   GOD.  331 

tuous  action,  it  proclaims  it  to  be  good.  This  faculty,  in  unfallen 
beings,  is  set  as  the  guard  of  virtue,  warning  it  of  danger,  and  en- 
couraging it  by  its  smiles  in  the  path  of  well-doing. 

But  it  is  never  to  be  forgotten  in  ethical  investigation,  that  the 
possession  of  virtue  and  the  possession  of  conscience  are  not  the 
same.  The  existence  of  a  judge  in  a  land  does  not  prove  that 
the  country  is  free  from  crime  ;  nay,  it  seems  rather  to  prove  that 
there  II  a  possibility  of  crime  ;  and  just  as  little  does  the  presence 
of  conscience  prove,  that  there  can  be  no  sin  in  the  soul — it  is 
rather  meant  to  warn  us  of  the  danger  of  sin.  In  a  pure  and  well- 
regulated  mind,  the  office  of  conscience  would  have  been  a  very 
easy  and  delightful  one.  Occasionally  giving  warning  of  danger, 
its  grand  office  would  have  been  to  stimulate  the  virtuous  affec- 
tions, by  the  sanction  which  it  gave,  and  the  rewards  which  it 
added  in  the  pleasing  emotions  which  it  excited. 

We  now  feel  as  if  we  had  a  firm  footing  to  stand  on,  when  we 
rise  from  the  character  of  man  to  the  character  of  God.  If  the 
physical  works  of  God  reflect  the  Divine  power  and  wisdom,  the 
original  moral  constitution  of  man  conducts  us  to  a  belief  in  still 
higher  attributes. 

So  far  as  man  can  judge  from  his  own  nature,  he  must  look 
upon  God  as  distinguished,  not  only  by  the  loftiness  of  his  intel- 
lectual being,  but  by  the  loveliness  of  his  affections.  Some  per- 
sons, with  the  view  of  exalting  the  Divine  Being,  would,  with  the 
ancient  Stoics,  strip  him  of  everything  that  bears  any  resemblance 
to  will  or  feeling  as  existing  in  the  human  breast.  He  has  been 
represented  by  such  as  a  mere  abstraction,  calling  forth  no  affec- 
tion, because  cherishing  no  affection.  This  whole  representation 
proceeds  on  the  idea,  that  intellect  is  so  much  higher  than  bene- 
volence. Yet  so  far  as  man  is  concerned,  every  thinking  mind 
must  acknowledge,  that  the  soul  is  existing  in  its  highest  state 
when  it  is  cherishing  a  holy  love ;  and  that  intellect  is  in  its  high- 
est exercise,  when  it  is  directing  us  to  the  object  on  which  that 
love  is  to  be  fixed.  Take  away  benevolence  from  a  moral  agent, 
and  you  take  away  the  very  quality  of  which  the  moral  faculty 
approves.  Take  away  affection,  warm  and  living  affection  from 
God,  and  you  take  away  the  quality  which  most  endears  God  to 
our  souls  ;  you  take  away,  if  we  may  so  speak,  the  very  heart  of 
God — the  heart  which  loves  us,  and  calls  forth  our  love  in  return. 
We  must  be  careful,  indeed,  to  elevate  the  Divine  Being  above 
weak  and  doting  and  partial  affection  ;  and  above  all  such  mere 


332      VIEW  OP  MAN'S  ORIGINAL  MORAL  CONSTITUTION, 

human  affections  as  arise  from  earthly  relationships,  such  as  family 
instincts  and  patriotism  ;  but  we  must  be  equally  careful,  on  the 
other  hand,  not  to  divest  him  of  those  lovely  affections  of  grace 
and  tenderness  and  compassion  which  cause  him  to  feel  so  deep 
an  interest  in  the  welfare  of  his  creatures,  and  which  excite  cor- 
responding feelings  in  their  breasts  towards  him. 

The  same  mental 'phenomena  conduct  us  to  a  belief  in  another 
attribute  of  the  Divine  character.  If  we  are  led  to  believe  that 
there  is  love  in  the  Divine  Being  corresponding  to  virtuous  affec- 
tion in  mati,  we  are  led  by  a  like  reason  to  believe,  that  there  is 
an  attribute  in  God  corresponding  to  the  moral  faculty  in  man. 
We  are  thus  introduced  to  another  feature  of  the  Divine  charac- 
ter. It  is  the  attribute  which  leads  him  to  approve  of  that  love, 
which  he  ever  cherishes,  and  to  disapprove  of  everything  of  an 
opposite  character.  There  is  not  only  an  infinite  love  in  the  Di- 
vine mind,  but  an  infinite  justice,  commending,  exalting,  defend- 
ing, and  regulating  that  love. 

It  thus  appears,  that  in  the  character  of  God  there  meet  two 
oo-ordinate  moral  attributes ; — infinite  benevolence  and  infinite 
righteousness.  We  can  conceive  that  there  may  be  persons  who 
wish  that  he  had  only  the  one  of  these  without  the  other — that 
he  had  merely  the  affection  without  the  holiness.  But  our  wishes 
will  not  alter  the  nature  of  God,  or  make  him  different  from  what 
he  is,  and  from  what  his  works  show  him  to  be.  It  is  easy,  no 
doubt,  to  conceive  of  a  being  of  exalted  power,  who  cares  only  for 
the  happiness,  without  looking  to  the  holiness  of  his  creatures, 
and  we  may  call  this  being  God ;  but  he  is  not  the  living  and  the 
true  God  ;  he  is  no  more  the  really  existing  God  who  is  thus  pic- 
tured by  us,  than  are  the  idols  which  the  heathens  make  and  wor- 
ship. The  one  is  as  much  the  creation  of  men's  fancy,  as  the 
others  are  the  workmanship  of  men's  hands.  If  you  ask,  why  is 
his  justice  so  unbending?  we  can  only  answer,  that  such  is  his 
very  nature;  and  that  justice  is  as  essential  to  the  character  of 
God,  as  even  wisdom,  or  power,  or  goodness.  Nor  can  the  wishes, 
the  complaints  of  sinful  men  or  fallen  angels,  render  him  less 
strictly  inflexible  in  his  justice.  Were  he  without  this  attribute, 
or  were  this  attribute  riot  infinite,  he  could  not  be  a  perfect  God, 
our  own  minds  being  the  judges.  For  we  have  discovered  that 
in  our  own  souls  which  testifies  that  God  is  holy,  and  approving 
of  the  exercise  of  this  his  holiness. 

We  are  thus  enabled,  too,  to  explain  in  some  measure  the  rela- 


AS    ILLUSTRATIVE    OF   THE    CHARACTER    OF   GOD.  333 

lion  of  the  Divine  love  to  the  Divine  holiness.  These  have  often 
been  represented  as  antagonist  principles  ;  and  yet  truly  they  are 
not  so,  though  there  are  conceivable  and  actual  circumstances  in 
which  their  separate  action  might  seem  to  tend  in  opposite  ways. 
Yet  in  themselves  they  are  conspiring,  and  not  conflicting  prin- 
ciples. When  Divine  love  is  exercised,  it  has  the  approbation  of 
Divine  holiness  ;  and  Divine  holiness  is  exercised  in  honoring  and 
guarding  Divine  love.  God  is  love,  is  in  his  very  will  and  affec- 
tions, love,  and  is  led  by  his  very  nature  to  approve  of  that  love 
which  is  in  his  very  essence. 

Let  it  be  observed,  however,  that  holiness  is  something  more 
than  the  mere  love  of  promoting  happiness.  It  is  not  so  much 
the  love  of  promoting  happiness,  as  the  love  of  that  pure  love 
which  seeks  the  promotion  of  happiness.  This  attribute,  in  one 
sense,  is  inferior  to  love,  because  its  proper  exercise  consists  in 
approving  of  love,  and  in  guiding  love.  In  another  sense,  it  is 
the  highest  attribute  in  the  Divine  nature,  higher  than  benevo- 
lence itself,  for  it  sits  in  judgment  upon  benevolence,  which  it 
proclaims  to  be  supremely  and  ineffably  good,  and  regulates  and 
directs  that  benevolence.  Let  us  look  up  with  equal  admira- 
tion to  both,  as  constituting  the  two  polar  forces  of  the  moral 
universe*  the  two  essential  elements  of  the  moral  character  of 
God, 


CHAPTER  II. 

ACTUAL  MORAL  STATE  OF  MAN. 

SECTION  I.— SOME  PECULIAR  LAWS  OF  THE  WORKING  OF  CON- 
SCIENCE. 

THE  two  inductive  methods  of  acquiring  knowledge  in  physi- 
cal science  are  observation  and  experiment.  It  has  been  doubted 
whether  the  latter  can  be  employed  in  investigating  the  processes 
of  the  human  mind,  and  it  must  at  once  be  admitted  that  it  re- 
quires certain  modifications  in  order  to  suit  it  to  the  new  object  to 
which  it  is  directed.  Even  in  the  physical  sciences  experiment 
in  chemistry  is  somewhat  different  from  experiment  in  mechanics, 
and  experiment  in  physiology  is  different  from  experiment  in  un- 
organized bodies  ;  and  we  must  expect  it  to  require  soi»e  change 
before  it  can  be  applied  to  a  spiritual  substance.  While  it  is  most 
dangerous  in  some  cases,  and  difficult  in  all,  to  experiment  on  the 
human  mind,  it  may  be  safely  and  confidently  asserted  that  ex- 
periment can  be  wrought  upon  it.  We  suspect  that  the  poet 
Byron  artificially  put  his  mind  in  certain  states,  with  the  view  of 
calling  forth  those  gloomy  ideas  and  convulsive  feelings  which  he 
has  embodied  in  his  poetry.  Such  experiments,  it  must  be  ac- 
knowledged, are  very  perilous,  more  so  than  those  which  Davy 
tried  with  inflammable  gasses,  or  than  those  which  Hahnemann, 
the  founder  of  the  Homoeopathic  school  of  medicine,  wrought 
upon  the  bodily  frame,  when  he  tried  upon  himself  and  upon  a 
few  friends  those  medicines  which  he  adopted  into  his  code.  But 
the  mental  philosopher  requires  no  such  painful  experiments  as 
those  to  which  poets  have  subjected  their  feelings,  and  to  which 
anatomists  have  exposed  their  own  bodies  and  those  of  the  lower 
animals.  It  is  only  requisite  that  we  present  before  the  mind  an 
object  fitted  to  set  in  action  the  particular  faculty  or  feeling  which 
we  wish  to  examine,  and  then  carefully  note  the  result.  No  fac- 
ulty can  be  so  successfully  operated  on  in  the  way  of  experiment, 
as  well  as  in  the  way  of  observation,  as  the  conscience.  It  is  a  re- 


THE    WORKING    OP   CONSCIENCE.  335 

flex  faculty — Butler  calls  it  the  faculty  of  reflection — judging  of 
the  dispositions  and  voluntary  acts  of  responsible  beings.  In  order 
to  detect  the  law  of  its  operations,  it  is  only  needful  to  bring  these 
mental  states  before  it,  and  mark  its  judgments;  and  the  deci- 
sions of  this  supreme  court  give  us  a  correct  view  of  the  laws 
of  the  kingdom.  This  can  be  done  as  easily  as  material  sub- 
stances can  be  brought  under  the  power  of  the  magnet  or  galvanic 
wire.  Care  must  be  taken,  in  the  one  case  as  in  the  other,  to  sep- 
arate between  what  is  essential  and  what  is  accidental,  and  this 
may  be  done  most  successfully  by  varying  the  experiments,  or 
performing  them  in  new  and  different  circumstances.  In  particu- 
lar, care  must  be  taken  in  examining  the  decisions  of  the  moral 
faculty,  to  distinguish  between  its  workings  and  those  of  certain 
cognate  feelings,  and  particularly  of  the  sympathetic  emotions, 
which  are  so  strong  in  our  nature.  These  feelings,  if  we  be  not 
on  our  guard  against  them,  will  completely  disturb  the  operations 
of  the  conscience,  just  as  the  iron  in  a  ship  disturbs  the  working 
of  a  magnet.  In  such  cases  allowance  must  be  made  for  the  dis- 
turbing agent,  or  rather  the  object  must  be  placed  before  the 
mind  in  such  a  way  that  the  disturbing  circumstances  cannot 
operate. 

It  is  after  this  manner  that  we  would  proceed  to  observe  and 
experiment  on  the  workings  of  the  conscience  with  the  view  of 
noticing  its  decisions,  and  thereby  arriving  at  an  exact  estimate 
of  the  present  moral  condition  of  man.  At  this  point  we  have  to 
leave  all  the  ordinary  academic  and  scholastic  writers  on  ethics 
behind  us  ;  but  we  are  careful  to  take  with  us  all  the  important 
truths  regarding  the  essential  and  indestructible  principles  of 
man's  moral  nature  which  they  have  helped  us  to  establish.  We 
can  admire  with  them  the  beauty  of  the  constitution  of  man's 
moral  nature,  but  we  have  often  wondered  that  they  have  not 
seen  the  wide  incongruity  between  their  glowing  descriptions  of 
man  as  he  ought  to  be,  and  the  exhibitions  given  in  our  own 
hearts  and  in  the  world  of  man  as  he  actually  is.  We  are  not 
inclined,  indeed,  to  agree  with  many  otherwise  excellent  divines  in 
slighting  the  intimations  of  conscience  in  man's  nature ;  in  this 
respect  we  hold  by  the  doctrines  so  firmly  established  by  the  phi- 
losophers. But,  then,  adopting  these  very  principles  of  the  phi- 
losophers, taking  with  us  all  that  they  have  said  of  the  authority 
and  power  of  the  conscience,  we  would  bring  their  principles  to 
bear  upon  the  existing  state  of  mati. 


336  .         SOME    PECULIAR    LAWS    OP 

In  doing  so,  however,  i.t  may  be  useful  to  observe  a  little  more 
minutely  some  of  the  laws  of  the  working  of  the  conscience. 

First,  it  is  of  mental,  and  of  mental  acts  exclusively,  that  the 
conscience  judges.  It  has  no  judgment  whatever  to  pronounce  on 
a  mere  bodily  act.  We  look  out  at  the  window,  and  we  see  two 
individuals  in  different  places  chastising  two  different  children. 
The  conscience  pronounces  no  judgment  in  the  one  case  or  the 
other,  whatever  the  feelings  may  do,  until  we  have  learned  the 
motives  which  have  led  to  the  performance  of  the  acts.  If  upon 
inquiry  we  find  the  motive  in  the  one  case  to  be  the  extreme  care 
which  the  parent  takes  of  the  moral  well-being  of  his  child,  and  the 
motive  in  the  other  case  to  be  blind  passion,  we  now  approve  of 
the  one  individual  and  disapprove  of  the  other ;  but  let  it  be 
observed,  that  the  conscience  pronounces  its  judgment  not  on  the 
outward  actions,  but  on  the  internal  motives  and  feelings. 

2dly,  It  is  of  acts  of  the  will,  and  of  acts  of  the  will  exclusively, 
that  the  conscience  judges.  In  saying  so  we  use  will  in  a  large 
sense,  as  large  as  that  department  which  has  been  allotted  to  it, 
we  believe,  by  God  in  the  human  mind.  We  use  it  as  including 
all  wishes,  desires,  intentions,  and  resolutions,  all  that  is  properly 
active  and  personal  in  man.  Now,  we  think  that  the  principle 
needs  only  to  be  announced  to  command  conviction,  namely,  that 
it  is  of  acts  of  the  will,  and  acts  of  the  will  only,  that  the  conscience 
judges,  declaring  them  to  be  either  virtuous  or  vicious.  Of  mere 
sensations,  of  mere  intellectual  acts,  of  mere  sensibility,  it  takes  no 
direct  cognizance  ;  in  themselves  these  have  no  moral  qualities. 
No  doubt  these  sensations,  these  intellectual  ideas  or  emotions, 
may  be  fitted  to  lead  to  what  is  evil,  and  so  far  the  conscience  will 
be  led  to  pronounce  a  judgment  in  which  they  are  embraced  ;  but 
the  actual  judgment  pronounced  is,  that  the  will  is  doing  wrong 
in  not  instantly  taking  steps  to  banish  them  from  the  mind.  We 
read  an  obscene  book,  and  impure  imaginations  rise  up  in  our 
minds  :  but  here  let  it,  be  remarked,  that  what  the  conscience  con- 
demns is  not  so  much  the  mere  natural  feelings  as  the  voluntary 
reading  of  a  work  which  is  fitted  to  call  them  forth. 

Thirdly,  The  conscience  approves  and  disapproves  not  of  iso- 
lated acts  merely,  bat  also  of  the  mind  or  agent  manifested  in 
these  acts.  The  conscience  judges  according  to  truth,  and  regards 
all  mental  acts  as  the  mind  acting,  and  pronounces  its  verdict,  not 
so  much  on  the  mere  act  as  on  the  mind  voluntarily  acting  in 
them.  This  may  seem  an  unnecessarily  metaphysical  method  of 


THE    WORKING    OF    CONSCIENCE.  337 

expressing  an  obvious  truth,  but,  in  the  sequel,  it  will  be  found  of 
no  little  consequence  to  be  able  precisely  to  determine  what  is  the 
object  at  which  the  conscience  looks,  and  on  which  it  pronounces 
its  judgments. 

Fourthly,  The  conscience  pronounces  its  decision  on  the  state 
of  mind  of  the  responsible  agent  as  the  same  is  presented  to  it. 
It  is  not  the  business,  or  at  least  the  direct  office  of  the  conscience, 
to  determine  what  is  the  precise  mental  state — what  is  the  wish, 
desire,  intention,  or  resolution  of  any  responsible  agent.  This 
must  be  ascertained  by  the  usual  rules  and  laws  of  evidence,  and 
by  the  use  of  the  ordinary  intellectual  faculties.  It  is  upon  the 
view  of  the  voluntary  acts  of  the  mind,  as  they  are  represented  to 
it,  that  the  conscience  utters  its  sentence.  Thus,  in  the  case  which 
we  have  put  of  the  two  parents  chastising  their  children,  the  one 
act  presented  to  the  conscience  is  that  of  a  parent  seeking,  by 
proper  punishment,  to  correct  vice,  and  the  other  act  is  that  of  an 
individual  cherishing  passion,  and  acting  upon  it.  It  is  upon  this 
representation  that  the  conscience  proceeds,  and,  provided  the  re- 
presentation be  correct,  the  decision  will  be  infallible.  But  let  it 
be  observed  that  the  representation  may  be  an  erroneous  one. 
Under  the  influence  of  hasty  feeling  or  prejudice,  we  may  have 
formed  very  incorrect  judgments  as  to  the  real  state  of  mind  of  the 
individuals  whose  conduct  we  have  been  observing.  While  the 
conscience  has  pronounced  verdicts  which  are  righteous  in  them- 
selves, these  verdicts  may  be  mistaken  in  regard  to  the  given  indi- 
vidual ;  for  the  one  parent  may  not  have  been  under  the  influence, 
of  such  high-minded  virtue,  nor  the  other  the  slave  of  passion,  as 
has  been  supposed.  The  conscience  is  in  the  position  of  a  barris- 
ter, whose  opinion  is  asked  in  matters  of  legal  difficulty.  In  both 
cases  the  judgment  given  proceeds  on  the  supposed  accuracy  of  a 
representation  submitted,  but  which  may  be  very  partial,  or  very 
perverted.  . 

It  follows — Fifthly,  That  there  may  be  much  uncertainty,  or 
confusion,  or  positive  error,  in  the  judgments  of  the  conscience, 
because  given  upon  false  representations.  All  the  actions  of  man 
are  of  a  concrete  character.  By  far  the  greater  number  of  the  vol- 
untary acts  of  mankind  are  of  a  very  complex  nature.  It  is  diffi- 
cult  for  the  individual  himself,  and  still  more  difficult  for  a  neighbor, 
to  determine  what  are  the  precise  motives  by  which  he  is  influenced 
in  any  given  act.  The  springs  of  human  action  are  often  as  diffi- 
cult to  be  discovered  as  the  true  fountains  of  the  great  African 


338      PECULIAR    LAWS    OF    THE    WORKING    OF   CONSCIENCE. 

rivers,  which  rise  so  far  in  the  unapproachable  interior  ;  and  there 
is  room  for  endless  disputes  as  to  what  is  the  originating  and 
original  motive,  without  which  the  act  would  not  have  been  pur- 
posed or  performed  ;  and  when  we  have  fixed  on  any  one  sourcey 
we  are  not  sure  that  there  may  not  be  others  that  dispute  with  it 
the  pre-eminence. 

Meanwhile  the  conscience  will  pronounce  its  verdict  upon  the 
action,  according  to  the  representation  given  by  the  other  faculties 
of  the  mind.  Present  a  concrete  action,  more  particularly  if  a  com- 
plex one,  under  one  aspect,  and  the  conscience  will  approve  of  it ; 
present  it  under  a  different  aspect,  and  the  conscience  will  diap- 
prove  of  it.  Let  waVlike  achievements,  for  instance,  be  looked  at 
in  the  light  of  deeds  of  chivalry,  romance  and  courage,  and  the 
mind  will  be  elevated  by  the  very  contemplation  of  them  ;  and  the 
clang  of  the  trumpet  will  not  so  effectually  stir  up  the  war-horser 
as  the  narrative  of  the  exploits  of  heroes  will  awaken  enthusiasm. 
But  let  us  now  contemplate  the  same  actions  under  a  different 
aspect ;  let  us  now  see  the  blood  flowing  in  torrents,  and  hamlets 
and  cities  in  flames ;  let  us  hear  the  groans  of  the  wounded  and 
dying,  and  the  wails  of  the  widows  and  orphans,  as  the  news  are 
brought  to  them  of  the  friends  that  they  have  lost;  and  let  us  in- 
spect, too,  the  hearts  of  the  leaders  in  the  combat  and  observe  the 
reigning  pride,  ambition,  and  jealousy;  let  us  look  into  the  hearts 
of  their  followers,  and  as  we  discover,  besides  the  momentary  ex- 
citement produced  by  the  battle,  nothing  beyond  a  mercenary  trans- 
action, or  the  compulsory  following  of  a  chieftain — then  our  feel- 
ings change,  and  the  scene  is  regarded  with  abhorrence  and 
disgust. 

It  follows,  that  the  conscience  of  two  different  individuals,  or  of 
the  same  individual  at  two  different  times,  may  seem  to  pronounce 
two  different  judgments  on  the  same  deed.  We  say  seem,  for  in 
reality  the  two  deeds  are  different,  and  the  judgments  are  dif- 
ferent, because  the  deeds,  as  presented  to  the  conscience,  are  not 
the  same.  Thus,  in  the  case  which  we  have  just  put,  it  is  in  the 
one  instance  the  supposed  devotedness  and  magnanimity  that  are 
commended  ;  and  in  the  other  instance,  it  is  upon  the  selfishness  and 
cruelty  of  the  parties  that  the  condemnation  is  heaped.  When 
Mercury  stole  Apollo's  harp,  Apollo  was  at  first  inclined  to  be 
angry  ;  but  afterwards  forgot  the  crime,  in  his  admiration  of  the 
skill  displayed  in  the  perpetration  of  it.  The  Greeks,  in  this  fable, 
furnish  in  the  persons  of  their  gods  a  true  picture  of  human  nature, 


INFLUENCE    OP   A    DEPRAVED   WILL>  339 

of  the  tendency  of  mankind  to  overlook  the  moral  qualities 
of  actions,  and  fix  their  attention  on  other  features,  fitted  to  call 
forth  other  than  moral  feeelings. 

From  the  general  cause  now  referred  to,  have  proceeded,  if  we 
do  not  mistake,  those  irregularities  and  apparent  inconsistencies 
in  the  decisions  of  conscience  which  have  so  puzzled  and  con- 
founded ethical  and  metaphysical  inquirers.  The  approval  which 
was  thought  to  have  been  given  by  the  conscience  to  the  widow 
burning  herself  on  the  funeral  pile  of  her  husband  in  India,  and  to 
deceit  when  successful  among  the  ancient  Spartans,  and  to  the 
murder  of  children  in  the  South  Sea  islands,  and  the  exposing  of 
the  aged  and  of  helpless  children  in  Africa— all  originate  in  false 
views  presented  of  the  devotedness  of  the  widow,  of  the  heroism 
of  the  Spartan  youth  who  succeeds  in  compassing  a  difficult  end, 
and  of  the  misery  to  which  the  helpless,  whether  from  youth  or 
age,  might  be  exposed,  if  left  to  drag  out  an  existence,  for  the  sus- 
tenance of  which  no  adequate  provision  could  be  made. 

It  is  now  becoming  evident,  that  the  conscience  may  be  in  the 
breast  of  an  individual,  and  exerting  itself  in  a  kind  of  way,  and 
yet  his  whole  moral  judgments  be  utterly  perverted, 

A  thoroughly  virtuous  mind,  it  is  true,  could  not  be  led  to  pro- 
nounce any  such  distorted  or  erroneous  judgments.  But  the  virtu- 
ousness  of  an  agent  does  not  consist  in  the  possession  of  a  con- 
science, but  in  the  possession  of  virtuous  affections  and  principles 
of  action.  A  mind  under  the  influence  of  proper  principle,  would 
not  present  those  false  pictures  to  the  conscience  which  draw  forth 
a  prejudiced  judgment.  It  is  because  the  mind  of  man  is  disor- 
ganized and  perverted  ;  it  is  through  the  influence  of  pride,  vanity, 
and  passion  that  such  false  views,  fitted  and  intended  to  mislead 
and  delude  the  conscience,  are  presented.  Much  of  human  wicked- 
ness is  displayed  in  the  ingenious  schemes  which  are  contrived  to 
deceive  the  moral  faculty,  and  avoid  its  humbling  judgments. 


SECTION  II— INFLUENCE  OF  A  DEPRAVED  WILL  UPON  THE  MORAL 

JUDGMENTS. 

The  will,  we  have  seen  is  the  seat  of  responsibility.  At  the 
side  of  the  will,  which  is  free,  God  hath  placed  in  the  soul  a  law 
which  is  fixed,  The  morally  good  consists  in  the  conformity  of 
the  free  will  to  the  fixed  law.  Sin,  on  the  other  hand,  consists 
essentially  in  the  will  refusing  to  submit  itself  to  the  moral  law  of 


340  INFLUENCE    OF    A    DEPRAVED    WILL 

God.     There  is  sin  when  the  will  desires  that  which  is  forbidden, 

when  Jt  prefers  that  which  is  pleasurable  to  that  which  is  morally 
nf/ht,  on  the  two  corning  into  competition,  or  when  it  resolves  on 
the  performance  of  a  deed  which  the  law  of  God  condemns. 

Let.  \r-  -uppose.  then,  that  the  will  of  a  rc-pon-ible  being  has 
set  itself  fiee  from  the  restraint..--  of  the,moral  law.  Let  us  sup- 
pose that.  m. -in  -we  say  suppose,  for  at  present  we 
assume  it,  leaving  the  proof  till  afterwards.  We  are  now  to  show 
that  this  perverted  and  rebellious  will  may  come  to  exercise  a  re- 
for  evil  upon  the  deci-ions  of  the  •  e.  This 
iri/lin  no  doubt  indirect.  ami  may  be  working,  while  the 
II  altogether  uni .on  -< ion- :  of  it ;  but  it  is  not  on  that  account 
the  less  potent.  It  may  he  all  the  greater,  from  the  circumstance 
tb;it  the,  ad.oi  U  not  RWftM  of  it.  an  raking  n<>  9tepfl  to  pre- 
vent if-  -~l.ea.lt by  approach. 

It  is  not  difficult  to  explain    this   phenomenon  of  the  influence 

of  the  will  upon  the  other  fa.  ultie-.  of  the  mind.      Dr.  Brown    has 

•QdieJogeoiOttl     peculation     on  thi-    subject.      "That    it  is  of  the 

very  nature,  of  emotion,  to  lender  more  vivid  all  the  mental  , 

lion      with   which    they  are   peculiarly  combined,  as   if  their  own 

in     ome  UK  a   me  divided  with  these,  every  one  who 

felt   anv  -motion    mu.-t   have   e\pei  i<  )!(  ,-d       'The  eye 

double,  (juickne      to  perceive  what  we  love  or 

what  we  hope  or  fear.      Other  object -may  be  seen  slightly; 
but.    these,  if  seen    at   all.  become,   m   la.nt.ly  permanent,  and 
nol  appear    |«,    \\~    without    impie   -ii,L,    their    pre -. -n. -e    m  stronger 
feelinL'  on    our     en-i      and  on    our    soul.""      He    then      bow-    how 
this  vividiM-s-;.  producing  a  pei  inanency  of  the  emotion,  inline, 
in  a  powerful  manner,  the  whole  train  <>!  'lion. 

\\  e  ;nr  not  (|iiilc  sure,  that,  tin  [f  an  adeijuafe  explanation  of 
the.  phe.nomena.  The  emotional  nature  of  any  state  of  mind 
inn  i  ol  roiii  e  produce  liveline  :  andlhi-  liveliness  may,  accord- 
ing to  '-•OHM:  law  of  the,  human  mind,  have,  an  influence  upon  tha%t 
-tale  of  mind.  But  it  is  not  to  be  forgotten  that  the  liveliness  is 
one  thiiiL':  and  the,  pei  manenre  another  lhin*_r.  though  Dr.  Bn,wn 
seem  lo  lidr  iiiicon  rioiisly  from  the  one  to  the  other.  The,  per- 
manent <•  of  a  i.hoirjbt.  accompanied  with  will,  arises,  we  main- 
i.am.  from  tin-,  direct  power  (jl  the  will  retaining  the  thought. 

We,  are,  (juite,  aware  that  the  will  cannot  directly  call  up  any 
:ib..cni  idea  or  any  idea  not  immediately  before  the  mind.  To 

*  Lect.  »1. 


UPON    THE    MORAL    JUDGMENTS.  .  341 

will  a  given  recollection  into  existence,  is  already  to  be  in  posses- 
sion of  that  recollection  But  the  mind,  while  yet  without  the 
precise  recollection,  may  know  that  there  is  a  recollection  which 
it  is  desirable  to  recall.  If  we  have  forgot,  for  example,  the  name 
of  an  individual,  whose  person  and  character  we  distinctly  re- 
member, we  cannot  by  the  direct  power  of  the  will  call  up  the 
name  ;  but  by  an  act  of  the  will,  we  may  keep  the  recollection  of 
the  man's  person  and  character  before  us,  till  his  name  is  sug- 
gested by  the  natural  process  of  association. 

The  will  has  thus  a  direct  and  an  indirect  power  over  the  train 
of  thought  and  feeling.  It  has  a  direct  power  in  retaining  any 
given  thought  or  idea  ;  for  as  long  as  the  will  to  retain  it  exists, 
that  very  will  to  retain  it  keeps  the  idea  before  the  mind.  The 
will  has  also  a  most  important  indirect  influence.  In  retaining 
any  given  idea  or  recollection,  it  can  command  a  whole  train  of 
association  connected  with  it.  In  retaining  the  idea  of  a  mother, 
for  instance,  and  dwelling  upon  it,  it  may  recall  all  the  pleasant 
scenes  of  childhood,  of  tenderness  and  unwearied  care,  that  are 
associated  with  her.  The  will  has  also  a  power  of  driving  away 
an  unpleasant  thought,  not  directly  but  indirectly,  by  willingly 
following  other  trains  of  association,  and  taking  steps  to  call  up 
these  trains  of  association.  We  wish,  let  us  suppose,  to  banish 
the  recollection  of  some  wound  or  sore  which  grates  on  our  sensi- 
bility :  we  cannot  do  so  directly,  but  we  can  accomplish  our  end 
effectually,  by  rushing  into  some  other  scene  fitted  to  interest  us, 
and  there  following  the  train  of  conception  that  is  started.  Or  we 
wish  to  rid  ourselves  of  the  recollection  of  an  unhandsome  un- 
generous deed  which  has  been  done  to  us ;  we  cannot  effect  this  by 
dwelling  on  the  deed,  it  is  evident,  but  we  may  effect  it  by  medi- 
tating on  some  other  subject,  as  upon  the  far  greater  provocation 
which  we  ourselves  have  given  to  our  heavenly  Lord. 

It  appears,  then,  that  in  the  influence  exercised  by  the  will 
there  is,  first  of  all,  a  retention  of  a  fixed  idea,  and  around  this 
there  will  cluster  other  ideas,  with  their  corresponding  feelings. 
And  let  us  suppose  that  the  ideas  suggested  are  fitted  to  raise 
emotions,  there  will  now  not  only  be  the  influence  of  the  will,  but 
of  the  emotions  which  are  excited.  But  conceptions  of  moral 
good  and  evil  are  all  accompanied  with  emotions  more  or  less 
lively,  as  are  also  all  the  objects  which  are  fitted  to  sway  the  will. 
It  is  easy  to  understand,  then,  how  in  all  cases  in  which  the  con- 
science and  will  are  in  joint  operation  there  should  be  the  influ- 


342  INFLUENCE    OF   A    DEPRAVED    WILL 

ence  of  emotion.  Now,  it  is  a  law  of  mental  operation  that  emo- 
tions tend  to  quicken  the  train  of  ideas  in  the  mind.  When  the 
mind  is  in  an  emotional  state,  the  thoughts  run  as  in  torrents,  and 
the  feelings  fly  as  with  a  hurricane  velocity.  In  the  phenomena 
now  to  be  considered,  there  may  thus  be  a  power  of  will  retaining 
a  radical  thought,  and  a  power  of  emotion  collecting  around  it  a 
rapid  succession  of  thoughts  and  feelings. 

The  tendency  of  will  and  desire  is  to  retain  the  favorite  thought 
and  feeling.  The  tendency  of  emotion,  on  the  other  hand,  is  to 
accelerate  the  mental  states.  This  difference  of  influence  on  the 
train  of  association  is  one  of  the  many  proofs  which  may  be  urged 
to  establish  the  difference  between  the  optative  and  emotional 
parts  of  man's  nature.  But  while  desire  and  emotion  are  different, 
yet  desire  is  commonly  connected  with  emotion,  inasmuch  as  the 
objects  which  lead  to  desire  also  stir  up  emotion.  Now,  it  is  to  this 
emotion  that  we  owe,  to  .some  extent,  the  immense  number  of  ideas 
and  feelings  which  are  congregated  round  a  common  point,  while 
we  owe  the  stability  of  the  point  of  attraction  not  to  the  emotion  con- 
nected with  the  desire,  but  to  the  desire  itself.  We  desire  that  a 
friend,  a  mother  in  ill  health  may  recover ;  and  we  owe  the  number 
of  the  plans  of  recovery  suggested,  to  the  rapidity  of  thought  caused 
by  the  emotions  which  the  very  conception  of  that  mother  raises ; 
but  we  owe  the  continuance  of  the  fundamental  thought  to  the 
influence  of  a  deeper  part  of  our  constitution  obeying  very  differ- 
ent laws.  The  desire,  in  short,  is  the  central  body,  and  the 
thoughts  and  emotions  the  lesser  bodies  which  dance  around  it. 
No  doubt,  that  central  body  has  also  its  motions,  but  they  are 
round  another  centre,  constituting  the  true  motive  power  of  the 
human  mind. 

In  all  those  states  of  mind  in  which  we  have  both  will  and  emo- 
tion, we  have  thus  a  double  class  of  phenomena,  a  principle  of 
permanence,  and  a  principle  of  change ;  a  continuous  thought, 
and  a  succession  of  thoughts ;  a  centre,  and  bodies  circling  round 
it.  We  have  the  same  thing  as  the  ancient  Romans  had  when 
the  body  of  Virginia  was  brought  forth  to  the  people  -t  or  when 
Antony  exposed  the  body  of  Caesar,  lifting  up  the  toga,  and  ex- 
hibiting to  the  people  the  blood-stained  garment,  and  pointing  to 
I  lie  wounds  by  which  their  friend  had  been  murdered,  till  the  mul- 
titude, under  a  tumult  of  feelings  excited  by  the  object  before  them, 
tore  in  pieces  those  who  were  supposed  to  be  associated  with  the 
murder,  and  demolished  or  burnt  the  houses  of  the  conspirator-s. 


XJPON    THE    MORAL    JUDGMENTS.  343 

And  so,  too,  in  the  will  there  is  an  object  continuously  presented 
before  the  mind,  and  this  object  gathering  round  it  a  whole  host 
of  feelings. 

The  intense  desire  thus  keeps  the  thought  fixed,  and  the  feel- 
ings keep  other  thoughts  playing  around  it.  When  the  object  is 
of  a  pleasant  kind,  and  is  pleasantly  associated,  all  the  feelings  are 
of  a  pleasant  kind,  and  the  desire  becomes  a  source  and  centre  of 
happiness  diffused  around  it,  as  heat  is  from  a  fire,  as  light  is  from 
the  sun.  On  the  other  hand,  when  the  object  contemplated  is 
painfulj  when  it  is  the  desire  to  avoid  punishment,  for  instance, 
or  to  flee  from  an  angry  God,  then  the  feelings,  while  intensely 
active,  are  all  intensely  distressing,  and  the  mind  moves  round  a 
point  like  the  chained  animal  when  it  is  fretted  round  the  post  to 
which  it  is  tied,  or  like  the  moth  fluttering  round  the  light  which 
is  to  consume  it. 

The  will,  whether  it  exists  in  the  shape  of  desire,  or  positive 
purpose,  has,  it  thus  appears,  an  influence,  direct  and  indirect, 
upon  the  train  of  thought  and  feeling.  Now,  the  will  being  re- 
sponsible for  its  acts,  is  responsible  for  all  the  effects  which  these 
acts  produce.  If  these  are  evil,  the  mind  cannot  escape  from  the 
blame,  on  the  ground  that  they  are  not  immediately  voluntary. 
There  may  be  acts  in  the  highest  degree  sinful,  though  not  pro- 
ceeding immediately  from  the  will.  As  proceeding  really,  though 
not  directly,  from  the  will,  it  must  be  held  as  accountable  for 
them.  The  depraved  will  has  undoubtedly  to  answer  for  all 
the  brood  which  it  may  hatch.  Those  who  sow  dragon's  teeth 
must  be  prepared  to  take  the  blame  of  all  the  deeds  which  the 
armed  men  who  spring  up  may  perform.  A  rebellious  will  may 
thus  be  responsible  for  errors  which  are  in  themselves  merely  in- 
tellectual, just  as  the  drunkard  is  held  accountable  in  every  court 
of  law  for  the  acts  which  he  commits  during  intoxication.  A 
perverted  will  may  be  chargeable  with  the  full  blame  of  a  state  of 
disordered  feeling  produced  by  it,  just  as  the  opium-eater  is  to 
blame  for  those  frightful  images  which  his  cherished  habit  has 
necessarily  called  up. 

Dr.  Chalmers  has  shown  how  mere  emotions,  through  their  con- 
nection more  or  less  remote  with  the  will,  may  become  morally 
goocl  and  morally  evil.  "It  is  this  which  imparts  virtuousness  to 
emotion,  even  though  there  be  nothing  virtuous  which  is  not  vo- 
luntary. It  is  true  that  once  the  idea  of  an  object  is  in  the  mind, 
it  scounterpart  emotion  may,  by  an  organic  or  pathological  law, 


344  INFLUENCE    OF   A    DEPRAVED    WILL 

have  come  unbidden  into  the  heart.  The  emotion  may  have  come 
unbidden,  but  the  idea  may  not  have  come  unbidden.  By  an  act 
of  the  will  it  may,  in  the  way  now  explained,  have  been  summon- 
ed at  the  first  into  the  mind's  presence,  and  at  all  events  it  is  by  a 
continuous  act  of  the  will  that  it  is  detained  and  dwelt  upon." 
"It  cannot  bid  compassion  into  the  bosom  apart  from  the  object 
which  awakens  it ;  but  it  can  bid  a  personal  entry  into  the  house 
of  mourning,  and  then  the  compassion  will  flow  apace ;  or  it  can 
bid  a  mental  conception  of  the  bereaved  and  afflicted  family  there, 
and  then  the  sensibility  will  equally  rise  whether  a  suffering  be 
seen  or  a  suffering  be  thought  of.  .  In  like  manner,  it  cannot  bid 
into  the  breast  the  naked  and  unaccompanied  feeling  of  gratitude, 
but  it  can  call  to  recollection,  and  keep  in  recollection,  the  kindness 
which  prompts  it,  and  the  emotion  follows  in  faithful  attendance 
on  its  counterpart  object.  It  is  thus  that  we  can  will  the  right 
emotions  into  being,  not  immediately  but  mediately — as  the  love 
of  God,  by  thinking  on  God — a  sentiment  of  friendship,  by  dwell- 
ing in  contemplation  on  the  congenial  qualities  of  our  friend — the 
admiration  of  moral  excellence,  by  means  of  a  serious  and  stead- 
fast attention  to  it.  It  is  thus,  too,  that  we  bid  away  the  wrong 
emotions,  not  separately  and  in  disjunction  from  the  objects,  for  the 
pathological  law  which  unites  objects  with  emotions  (is  it  not  rather 
'•onc'eptions  with  emotions?)  we  cannot  break  asunder,  but  we  rid 
our  heart  of  the  emotions  by  ridding  our  mind  of  their  exciting  and 
originating  thoughts — of  anger,  for  instance,  by  forgetting  the 
injury ;  or  of  a  licentious  imagination,  by  dismissing  from  our 
fancy  the  licentious  image,  or  turning  our  sight  and  our  eyes  from 
viewing  vanity."  * 

But  the  will  exercises  an  indirect  influence,  not  only  upon  the 
emotions,  but  also  upon  the  judgment.  It  is  proverbial,  indeed, 
that  the  wishes  of  the  heart  exercise  a  most  powerful  influence 
upon  the  common  judgments  of  the  mind.  It  has  not  been  so 
frequently  observed,  that  the  will  may  sway  in  a  prejudicial  man- 
ner the  moral  judgments.  This  phenomenon  is  to  be  explained 
in  much  the  same  way  as  those  to  which  we  have  just  referred. 

Here  we  must  take  along  with  us  some  of  those  observations 
made  in  the  last  section  upon  the  working  of  the  moral  faculty. 
The  conscience,  it  must  be  remembered,  is  a  reflex  faculty,  pro- 
nouncing its  decision  upon  the  case  as  submitted  to  it.  In  ordei 
to  observe  how  the  will  is  fitted  to  sway  the  decisions  of  the  con- 
*  Moral  Philosophy,  chap,  v 


UPON    THE    MORAL    JUDGMENTS.  345 

science,  let  us  suppose  that  the  will  is  bent  upon  a  particular  course 
of  conduct,  and  suggests  its  performance  to  the  mind.  Let  us 
suppose,  for  instance,  that  Caesar  has  come  to  the  river  Rubicon, 
on  his  way  towards  Rome,  which  he  is  bent  upon  reaching.  He 
knows  that  the  crossing  of  this  stream  is  a  violation  of  the  laws 
of  his  country ;  but  when  the  thought  of  this  occurs  to  him,  he 
banishes  it  as  speedily  as  possible.  Other  thoughts  meanwhile 
rise  up  before  his  mind,  and  are  cherished — the  evil  which  Pompey 
and  his  faction  are  doing  in  Rome,  and  the  benefit  which  his 
country  might  derive  from  their  expulsion.  We  believe  Caesar  in 
the  act  to  have  been  swayed  by  ambition,  and  not  a  perverted 
moral  sense ;  yet  we  can  conceive  how,  in  the  way  now  indicated, 
he  may  have  succeeded  in  deceiving  the  moral  faculty,  and  justi- 
fying his  conduct  to  himself.  Or  let  us  suppose,  as  a  case  more 
in  point,  that  certain  of  the  conspirators  of  Caesar  are  bent  upon 
ridding  themselves  of  one  who  is  regarded  by  them  as  having  rob- 
bed his  country  of  its  liberties.  It  is  easy  to  see  how  by  dwelling 
on  one  aspect  of  the  case,  under  the  influence  of  desire,  the  deed, 
as  a  whole,  may  come  to  be  regarded  as  in  the  highest  degree 
commendable.  The  desert  of  the  ambitious  tyrant  will  be  seen  in 
fearfully  dark  colors,  and  the  mind  will  fondly  dwell  on  the  im- 
mediate and  glorious  advantages  which  are  to  arise  from  his  over- 
throw; and  these  features  being  alone  and  vividly  presented  to 
the  conscience,  and  the  other  aspects  of  the  deed  being  carefully 
concealed,  the  conscience  will  now  give  its  approval,  and  the  parties 
rush  to  the  commission  of  the  deed,  as  one  which  they  are  imper- 
atively called  to  perform. 

Assuming,  then,  (for  the  proof  must  be  deferred  to  a  succeeding 
section)  that  the  will  goes  wrong,  it  is  conceivable  that  THREE 

GENERAL  EFFECTS  OF  A  PREJUDICIAL  KIND  may  follow  from  the 

will  deceiving  the  conscience. 

(1.)  The  first  is.  that  we  mistake,  in  regard  to  certain  given 
actions,  calling  that  which  is  good  evil,  and  that  which  is  evil 
good.  The  will  accomplishes  this  by  presenting  the  evil  and  the 
good  in  a  false  light.  The  action  being  a  complex  one,  the  will 
may  present  it  only  under  one  aspect,  and  thus  draw  forth  a  false 
judgment.  A  good  action,  which  we  are  unwilling  to  perform, 
comes  to  be  presented  as  leading  to  pain,  or  to  certain  prejudicial 
consequences,  and  the  conscience  is  led  to  give  its  disapproval  of 
it.  An  evil  action,  which  we  are  bent  upon  committing,  conies  to 
be  seen  only  as  leading  to  happiness,  and  the  conscience  is  kept 


346  INFLUENCE    OF   A   DEPRAVED   WILL 

from  laying  a  sentence  of  disapprobation  upon  it.  Doubts  will  no 
doubt  rise  as  to  the  accuracy  of  these  judgments,  upon  other  views 
involuntarily  suggesting  themselves  to  the  mind  ;  but  the  will  con- 
trives to  drive  them  away  with  all  available  speed. 

Thus  it  is,  that  sin  comes  to  be  adopted  as  morally  good.  Hence 
the  difficulty  of  getting  a  favorite  sin  condemned.  Charge  it  at 
any  one  point,  or  at  any  one  time,  and  it  immediately  assumes  the 
name  of  some  virtue  to  which  it  bears  a  partial  resemblance.  Is 
the  man  forgetting  God,  and  the  duties  which  he  owes  to  him, 
that  he  may,  through  deep  anxiety  and  careful  frugality,  and  a 
contempt  of  present  comforts,  amass  wealth,  and  purchase  earthly 
possesions, — he  calls  his  conduct  by  the  name  of  praiseworthy  in- 
dustry. Is  he  selfishly  and  systematically  employed  in  raising 
himself  step  by  step  in  society,  to  the  disregard  of  all  higher 
claims  and  more  important  duties, — he  says  that  he  is  swayed  by 
an  innocent  regard  for  the  respect  of  his  fellow-men.  Or  is  he  in 
the  way  of  despising  the  poor,  and  fostering  a  spirit  of  revenge, 
and  avoiding  the  confession  of  sin, — his  conduct  passes  for  spirit 
and  magnanimity.  Or  is  he  adicted  to  rudeness,  to  quarrelsome- 
ness, und  profanity, — he  claifhs  the  merit  due  to  independence  of 
thinking  and  acting.  Is  he  led  to  give  a  servile  obeisance  to  the 
prevailing  opinion,  or  conceal  his  sentiments  in  the  presence  of  per- 
sons of  rank  and  name. — he  shelters  his  conduct  under  the  guise 
of  modesty  and  civility  of  manners. 

It  is  in  this  way  'that  we  account  for  the  perverted  moral  judg- 
ments of  mankind. 

(2.)  A  second  fatal  effect  follows  ; — men  come  to  form  too  favor- 
able an  estimate  of  their  own  character. 

A  number  of  circumstances  contribute  to  this  end. 

First  of  all,  there  is  an  unwillingness  on  the  part  of  those  who 
have  committed  sin,  candidly  to  inspect  themselves.  From  a 
secret  feeling  that  all  is  not  right,  they  are  afraid  to  look  into  the 
state  of  their  heart  and  conduct,  lest  dark  disclosures  should  be 
made.  Just  as  the  impenitent  criminal  would  avoid  the  bar  of 
the  judge  and  the  examination  of  the  witnesses,  so  would  the  sin- 
ner flee  from  the  sifting  inspection  of  the  moral  law.  Just  as  the 
murderer  would  visit  any  spot  on  this  earth's  surface,  rather  than 
that  at  which  the  deed  was  committed,  and  recollect  any  scene  of 
his  past  life  more  willingly,  than  he  would  remember  the  blood 
which  he  shed,  and  the  shrieks  of  his  dying  victim ;  so  would  the 
sinner  keep  away  from  everything  that  might  remind  him  of  his 


UPON    THE    MORAL    JUDGMENTS.  347 

sin.  Or,  if  constrained  to  admit  an  investigation,  he  will  yet  con- 
trive, like  Rachel,  to  keep  one  spot  concealed,  and  that  the  one  in 
which  he  retains  the  idols  of  his  worship,  and  the  inquiry  termi- 
nates in  a  more  confirmed  deception. 

Hence  we  find  that  of  all  branches  of  knowledge,  the  knowledge 
of  ourselves  and  of  our  sin  is  that  which  is  most  neglected.  In 
all  other  sciences,  knowledge  flatters  our  vanity,  raises  us  in  the 
eyes  of  our  neighbors,  increases  our  influence  in  society ;  but  a 
searching  inquiry  into  the  state  of  our  heart  wounds  our  pride,  and 
lowers  us  in  our  own  esteem.  Hence  it  is  that  we  meet  continu- 
ally with  persons  possessed  of  great  shrewdness  and  sagacity  in 
all  other  matters,  who  are  yet  lamentably  ignorant  of  themselves. 
Many  have  attained  to  an  extraordinary  knowledge  of  mankind 
in  general,  and  can  discern  at  once  the  weak  points  of  every 
neighbor,  and  yet  are  pitiably  blind  to  every  one  of  their  own  in- 
firmities. It  is  amusing  to  observe  regarding  them,  that  of  all 
persons  within  the  circle  of  their  acquaintanceship,  they  are  per- 
haps the  only  parties  to  whom  their  failings  are  unknown.  There 
are  individuals,  skilled  in  all  other  science,  utterly  ignorant  of  this; 
capable  of  calculating  the  motions  of  the  heavenly  bodies,  and 
yet  knowing  nothing  of  the  movements  of  their  own  hearts ;  of 
predicting  the  eclipses  of  the  sun  and  planets,  and  yet  knowing 
nothing  of  the  dark  spots  on  their  own  characters  j  of  decompos- 
ing the  material  substances  around  them,  and  yet  never  analy- 
zing the  motives  by  which  they  are  swayed.  Many,  we  suspect, 
pass  from  the  cradle  to  the  grave  under  the  influence  of  divers 
views,  feelings,  impulses,  and  passions  ;  but  without  once  stopping 
to  inquire,  what  is  their  character  or  state,  in  relation  to  God  and 
his  law.  Rather  than  confess  the  danger,  by  casting  out  their 
sounding-lines  and  measuring  the  depths,  they  permit  themselves 
to  drift  along,  they  know  not  whither,  till  at  last  death,  like  the 
cry  of  breakers  a-head,  awakes  them  from  their  lethargy,  but  only 
to  show  them  stranded  as  a  wreck  on  the  shores  of  eternity. 

This  shrinking  from  inspection — this  unwillingness  on  the  part 
of  the  human  heart  to  submit  to  examination — this  trembling 
and  shaking,  and  studious  concealment — all  are  indicative  of  con- 
scious guilt.  The  party  would  not  be  so  disinclined  to  look  into 
his  accounts  were  he  not  afraid  to  discover  losses,  debt,  and  prob- 
able bankruptcy.  The  limb  would  not  so  shrink  were  there  not 
disease  preying  upon  it. 

Yet  it  is  easy  to  see  how,  in  consequence  of  this  unwillingness 


348  INFLUENCE    OF    A    DEPRAVED   WILL 

to  look  at  the  sin,  that  it  may  readily  escape  detection.  "The 
heart  is  deceitful  above  all  things,  and  desperately  wicked." 
These  two  characteristics  of  the  heart  have  a  very  close  connec- 
tion. On  the  one  hand,  the  heart  is  so  deceitful,  just  because  it 
is  so  desperately  wicked.  It  shows  its  wickedness  by  its  deceit- 
fulness.  It  is  because  of  its  darkness  that  it  is  so  fitted  for  con- 
cealment and  seduction.  On  the  other  hand,  the  deceitfulness  of 
the  heart  tends  to  hide  its  wickedness  from  the  view.  Unless  we 
are  on  our  guard  against  its  power  to  deceive  us,  we  shall  never 
become  acquainted  with  its  desperate  wickedness. 

But  there  is  something  more  than  a  mere  negative  ignorance 
produced  by  a  deceitful  heart.  Mankind  come  to  clothe  them- 
selves in  a  positive  way  with  qualities  which  they  do  not  pos- 


When  man  would  look  to  his  past  life  the  heart  interposes,  and 
exhibits  everything  through  a  false  and  flattering  medium.  Dis- 
tance in  space,  we  know,  gives  a  particular  view  to  the  objects 
seen  j — thus,  we  read  of  the  Blue  Mountains,  though  no  moun- 
tains are  in  reality  of  a  blue  color.  Distance  in  time  may  have 
a  somewhat  similar  coloring  effect  on  the  objects  looked  at.  By 
the  natural  process  of  association  under  the  influence  of  desire, 
the  mind  recalls  most  readily  those  parts  of  our  past  life  which 
may  seem  creditable  to  our  talents  and  virtues,  and  all  else  is  con- 
signed to  oblivion.  We  meditate  with  delight  on  our  generosity, 
real  or  imaginary,  our  patience  under  suffering,  or  courage  in  the 
hour  of  danger.  We  remember  how  we  outstript  others  in  the 
path  of  duty,  how  we  advanced  when  they  shrank,  and  stood 
when  they  fell.  We  fondly  dwell  on  the  success  which  has  at- 
tended our  schemes,  on  the  compliments  which  have  been  paid 
us,  on  the  honors  heaped  upon  us  ;  and  when  we  think  of  our 
want  of  success,  it  is  to  attribute  the  whole  to  tbe  folly  of  friends, 
or  the  malice  of  enemies.  In  the  meantime  a  thousand  evil  ac- 
tions and  evil  feelings  are  willingly  forgotten.  We  never  forget 
that  we  gave  a  certain  sum  in  charity,  but  forget  that  it  was  only 
the  tenth  or  the  hundreth  part  of  what  we  expended  on  folly. 
The  memory,  like  a  skilful  flatterer,  thus  brings  before  us  only 
those  deeds  which  we  delight  to  hear  of,  and  leaves  all  others  un- 
noticed ;  or  should  these  others  at  times  force  themselves  upon  the 
attention,  the  heart  has  a  variety  of  excuses  to  urge.  The  act 
was  committed  in  our  younger  years,  and  it  is  suggested  that  it 
was  merely  a  deed  of  youthful  folly  implying  i  o  great  criminality, 


UPON    THE    MORAL    JUDGMENTS.  349 

or  palliating  circumstances  are  discovered  to  lessen  or  excuse  its 
criminality.  Has  the  person  been  indulging  evil  temper  or  vio- 
lent passion,  he  at  length  brings  himself  to  believe  that  this  was 
highly  proper,  when,  as  he  now  perceives,  so  much  malice  was  in- 
tended. His  cunning  he  will  dignify  with  the  name  of  wisdom, 
selfishness  is  called  prudence,  and  his  profligacy  the  becoming 
enjoyment  of  the  pleasures  of  this  world. 

The  will  exercises  an  equally  potent  and  prejudicial  influence 
when  men  look  to  their  present  character.  The  view  which  we 
get  of  an  object  depends  on  the  position  which  we  take.  Every 
man  sees  his  own  rainbow,  and  his  own  aurora  borealis ;  and 
from  the  position  at  which  he  views  himself  man  gets  a  delusive 
view  of  his  own  character.  He  imagines  that  he  possesses  good 
qualities,  which,  as  all  neutral  persons  know,  do  not  belong  to 
him,  and  is  unconscious  of  infirmities  of  which  all  his  friends  are 
perfectly  cognizant.  He  imagines,  perhaps,  that  he  is  possessed 
of  distinguished  ability,  whereas  all  who  are  acquainted  with  him 
know  the  opposite.  He  never  doubts  of  his  own  fortitude  and 
firmness  at  the  very  time  that  all  others  fear  that  he  will  shrink 
in  the  hour  of  trial.  He  imagines  that  he  is  generous  when  oth- 
ers know  that  he  is  selfish.  It  would  be  laughable,  were  it  not 
rather  pitiable,  to  see  the  man  deluded  with  himself,  while  others 
are  so  fully  aware  of  his  weaknesses. 

The  heart  yet  farther  deceives  us  when  we  would  look  to  our 
future  intentions.  It  seduces  us  in  this  way  when  it  fails  in  every 
other.  Even  when  mankind  have  been  constrained  to  discover 
that  they  have  acted  improperly  in  time  past,  they  still  imagine 
that  they  may  wipe  out  the  stain  by  their  future  exertions.  In 
particular,  we  are  apt  to  imagine  that  we  can  perform  any  deed 
on  our  forming  a  momentary  resolution  to  do  so.  The  young 
man  imagines  that  he  can  keep  his  character  pure  in  the  midst 
of  abounding  corruption,  and  attain  to  any  excellence  which  for 
the  time  he  may  resolve  to  reach.  He  wonders  to  see  individuals 
farther  advanced  in  life  so  sunk  into  criminality.  He  thinks  not 
that  in  his  future  life  he  may  descend,  step  by  step,  the  dark  path 
of  vice,  till  he  becomes  the  subject  of  similar  wonder.  And  yet 
other  men  will  not  profit  by  his  fall,  any  more  than  he  profited  by 
the  fall  of  others.  Every  man  imagines  that  he  has  some  peculiar 
charm  by  which  he  can  resist  all  the  enchantments  of  vice,  and 
come  forth  unhurt  from  its  dangerous  presence. 

Nothing  else  is  so  deceitful  as  a  perverted  will.     It  is  more  cun- 


350  INFLUENCE    OP   A   DEPRAVED   WILL 

ning  than  the  most  expert  thief,  craftier  than  the  deepest  politi- 
cian,  more  artful  than  the  wiliest  hypocrite,  and  more  plausible 
than  the  most  skilful  flatterer.  If  we  must  sometimes  be  on  our 
guard  against  the  treachery  of  our  fellow-men,  it  behooves  us  to 
exercise  a  still  more  watchful  jealousy  over  ourselves.  Every  wise 
man  is  sensitive  as  to  the  first  approaches  of  that  flattery  which 
interested  parties  give  him,  but  we  have  all  greater  cause  to  dread 
the  flattery  which  the  deceitful  heart  is  sending  up  as  incense. 
Other  parties,  in  their  attempts  to  deceive  us,  can  have  access  to 
us  only  at  certain  times,  and  in  particular  ways ;  but  the  heart 
presents  its  delusive  suggestions  at  all  times,  and  by  an  infinite 
variety  of  channels.  Much  as  there  is  among  us  of  deception, 
of  the  deception  of  one  man  by  his  neighbor,  there  is  much  more 
of  self-deception.  Of  all  flattery,  self-flattery  is  the  most  com- 
mon. 

And  what  is  the  general  result  of  all  this  willing  self-deceit. 
Man  becomes  full  of  himself,  of  his  past  conduct,  his  present 
character,  and  purposes  for  the  future.  He  constructs  for  himself 
an  imaginary  character  of  extraordinary  excellence,  which  he  is 
bound  to  admire.  "  Surely  every  man  walketh  in  a  vain  show." 
A  state  of  things  is  produced  as  delusive  as  the  scenes  of  a  novel, 
as  deceptive  as  the  exhibitions  of  the  stage  ;  and  he  himself  moves 
in  the  midst  of  them  as  a  hero.  The  glare  of  lamps  in  a  theatre, 
the  curtains  raised  and  dropped  at  the  appropriate  time,  the  per- 
spective, the  dresses,  and  personifications  in  tone  and  manner,  do 
not  so  deceive  the  spectator,  and  call  up  feelings  so  unsuited  to 
the  reality,  as  the  stage  pictures  and  actings,  which  the  fancy  cre- 
ates at  the  bidding  of  the  will — and  all  that  men  may  be  able  to 
personate  a  character  which  they  do  not  possess,  and  to  admire 
themselves  in  that  character.  Nor  can  there  be  a  greater  con- 
trast between  the  possibly  mean,  mercenary,  villanous  actor  and 
the  noble  character  personified  by  him,  between  the  actress  of 
doubtful  reputation  and  the  chastity  which  she  represents,  than 
there  is  between  the  real  man  with  his  sins  and  the  magnanimous 
hero  which  he  pictures  in  his  imagination.  The  mind  is  deceived 
by  the  one  exhibition  as  by  the  other ;  and  as  the  actor  receives 
plaudits  for  the  generosity  of  the  sentiments  uttered  by  him,  and 
the  actress  excites  sympathy  from  the  sufferings  which  she  is  sup- 
posed to  undergo,  so  do  mankind  claim  the  admiration  due  to  the 
imaginary  character  which  they  have  assumed.  Catherine  of 
Russia,  when  she  travelled  through  her  waste  dominions,  caused 


UPON    THE    MORAL    JUDGMENTS.  351 

painted  villages  to  be  raised  along  her  route,  that  she  might  be 
enabled  to  give  way  to  the  imagination  that  her  country  was 
flourishing  and  populous.  It  is  in  such  a  delusion  that  mankind 
in  general  pass  through  life,  raising  up  around  them,  by  the  power 
of  their  own  imaginations,  a  host  of  supposed  virtues  and  good 
qualities  in  the  midst  of  which  they  walk,  as  the  statues  of  the 
gods  walk  in  the  processions,  listening  to  a  constant  hymn  in  their 
own  praise. 

The  hypocrite  is  commonly  supposed  to  be  the  most  profound 
of  all  characters.  But  there  is  a  deeper  and  more  dangerous  de- 
ceit. There  are  persons  who  come  to  act  the  hypocrite  to  them- 
selves. The  man  who  has  been  deluded  by  his  neighbor  for 
years  is  not  more  astonished  when  his  eyes  are  opened,  than  are 
the  persons  now  referred  to  when  their  own  character  stands  fully 
revealed  to  them. 

(3.)  A  third  prejudicial  effect  follows — the  mind  becomes  com- 
pletely perverted  and  disordered. 

We  hold  that  a  mind,  whose  will  had  submitted  itself  in  every 
respect  to  the  law  of  God,  could  not  be  led  to  pronounce  a  per- 
verted judgment ;  but  when  the  will  has  set  itself  in  rebellion 
against  its  law,  that  is  against  God,  it  is  conceivable  that  sin  may 
soon  spread  itself  through  the  whole  soul.  This  is  one  of  the 
most  fearful  of  all  the  tendencies  of  sin — its  tendency  to  propagate 
itself,  to  "  yield  seed  after  its  kind."  The  weed  getting  into  a 
garden  or  field  does  not  so  speedily  or  certainly  spread  itself  over 
the  whole  space,  as  sin  entering  the  mind  spreads  itself  through 
all  its  faculties  and  feelings.  If  we  do  not  mistake,  it  is  the  most 
fearful  element  in  what  divines  call  spiritual  death,  being  a  blind- 
ness and  perversion  of  mind  produced  by  indulgence  in  sin.  The 
very  mind  and  conscience  become  defiled. 

We  can  conceive  a  mind  so  utterly  perverted  by  an  habitual 
deception  practised  upon  itself,  that  at  length  it  can  scarcely  tell 
what  is  right  from  what  is  wrong,  or  find  out  clearly  the  path  of 
duty  even  when  it  has  a  passing  desire  to  discover  it.  We  know 
no  condition  more  pitiable  than  that  of  the  man  who  has  become 
thus  bewildered  through  the  original  wanderings  of  a  wayward 
inclination,  and  now  knows  not  how  to  return  to  the  path  of  duty; 
for  he  has  tracked  so  many  by-ways,  all  leading  from  the  right 
path,  that  he  has  a  difficulty,  at  every  step,  of  knowing  the  way 
in  which  he  ought  to  walk. 


352  JUDGMENTS    PRONOUNCED    BY    THE    CONSCIENCE 


SECTION  III— JUDGMENTS  PRONOUNCED  BY  THE  CONSCIENCE  UPON 
THE  CHARACTER   OF  MAN. 

Much  of  what  we  have  advanced  in  last  section  is  hypothetical. 
On  the  supposition  that  the  heart  is  wicked,  we  have  shown  how 
it  may  be  deceitful.  We  are  now  to  enter  upon  the  proof  of  its 
wickedness. 

We  may  come  to  discover  the  moral  character  of  man  in  two 
ways,  first,  by  bringing  the  conscience  to  judge  of  him ;  and 
secondly,  taking  with  us  proper  ideas  of  what  virtue  is,  we  may 
inquire  if  he  possesses  it.  The-  first  is  the  method  followed  in 
this  section.  We  are  to  arraign  man  at  the  bar  of  his  own  con- 
science. 

"  Christians,"  says  Edwards,  "  have  the  greatest  reason  to  be- 
lieve, from  the  Scriptures,  that  in  the  future  day  of  revelation  of 
the  righteous  judgment  of  God,  when  sinners  shall  be  called  to 
answer  before  their  Judge,  and  all  their  wickedness  in  all  its 
aggravations,  brought  forth  and  clearly  manifested  in  the  perfect 
light  of  that  day,  and  God  will  reprove  them,  and  set  their  sins 
before  them,  their  conscience  will  be  greatly  awakened  and  con- 
vinced, their  mouths  will  be  stopped,  all  stupidity  of  consciences 
will  be  at  an  end,  and  conscience  will  have  its  full  exercise,  and 
therefore  their  conscience  will  approve  the  dreadful  sentence  of 
the  Judge  against  them,  and  seeing  they  have  deserved  so  great 
a  punishment,  will  join  with  the  Judge  in  condemning  them."  As 
man  has  to  pass  through  this  scene  at  last,  it  may  be  as  well 
to  anticipate  it. 

It  will  not  be  difficult,  in  the  first  place,  to  show  that  the  con- 
science condemns  certain  actions  committed  by  us.  Let  the  purest 
man  on  earth  pause,  and  make  his  past  conduct  pass  under  the 
cognizance  of  his  conscience,  the  conscience  will  at  once  condemn 
particular  portions  of  it.  In  short,  the  conscience  announces  that 
every  man  has  sinned. 

Now,  there  is  much  more  implied  in  this  decision  than  those 
are  aware  of,  who  have  not  reflected  on  the  subject.  The  con- 
science has  in  the  name  of  God  pronounced  its  sentence,  and  the 
question  occurs — how  is  this  sentence  to  be  removed  ?  Conscience 
declares  to  every  individual  that  he  has  sinned,  but  does  not  point 
out  any  way  by  which  the  sin  may  be  forgiven.  The  conscience 
delivers  its  sentence  in  a  solemn  manner,  and  in  a  way  not  to  be 
misunderstood — but  does  the  conscience  ever  lift  up  its  sentence 


UPON  THE    CHARACTER    OF    MAN.  353 

from  the  guilty  party  ?  The  conscience  condemns  at  this  present 
time  the  sin  which  we  committed  yesterday ;  but  will  it  not 
also  condemn  the  same  deed  when  submitted  to  it  ten  or  fifty 
years  hence  ?  Is  there  any  lapse  of  time,  or  change  of  circum- 
stances, which  will  induce  the  conscience  to  revoke  its  own 
judgments? 

Upon  genuine  repentance,  accompanied  with  reparation,  is  the 
answer  which  some  parties  would  be  inclined  to  give.  Every 
one  acquainted  with  the  elements  of  Christian  Divinity  knows 
that  this  view  cannot  stand  investigation.  We  enter  not  at  pres- 
ent into  the  question,  as  to  whether  repentance  be  in  the  native 
power  of  a  being  who  has  once  fallen  into  sin.  That  remorse  is 
available  to  him,  we  doubt  not ;  but  remorse,  instead  of  pacifying 
the  mind,  only  exasperates  it.  But  instead  of  dwelling  on  this, 
we  insist  upon  a  more  positive  ground.  Repentance  in  many 
cases  can  make  no  possible  reparation  for  the  injury  which  has 
been  inflicted.  The  murderer's  repentance,  for  instance,  cannot 
bring  back  the  murdered  man  from  the  judgment-seat  of  God  to 
which  he  has  been  hurried,  nor  dry  up  the  tears  of  the  widow 
and  orphans  that  he  left  behind.  Repentance  in  many  cases  can- 
not make  reparation  to  the  injured  parties,  and  in  no  case  can  it 
make  reparation  to  the  law  of  God.  We  cannot  conceive  that 
the  Governor  of  the  universe  should  proclaim  throughout  the 
world  which  he  has  created,  that  his  intelligent  creatures  may 
break  his  law,  and  inflict  injury  as  they  please,  and  then  that  they 
will  be  forgiven  on  the  profession  of  repentance.  Does  it  not 
seem  as  if  the  conscience  would  condemn  such  a  mode  of  govern- 
ing the  universe  if  presented  to  it  ?  Without  insisting  on  this, 
we  think  it  evident  that  the  conscience  gives  no  intimation  that 
it  will  withdraw  its  sentence  upon  repentance  following  the  guilty 
deed.  All  that  conscience  declares  is,  that  penitence  is  a  becoming 
act  on  the  part  of  the  transgressor.  It  would  visit  the  impenitent 
with  a  double  sentence,  first  the  sentence  upon  the  primary  sin, 
and  then  the  sentence  upon  his  present  hardness  of  heart,  and 
continued  spirit  of  rebellion.  While  repentance,  when  genuine, 
may  be  our  present  duty,  it  does  not  appear  as  if  it  could  make 
any  atonement  for  past  transgression,  or  make  the  conscience  do 
anything  more  than  declare  that  this  penitent  frame  of  mind  is 
not  in  itself  sinful ;  and  that  the  person  who  cherishes  it  is  better 
than  the  individual  who  first  commits  the  sin  and  then  doubles  it 
by  forgetting  it  or  glorying  in  it. 

23 


354  JUDGMENTS    PRONOUNCED    BY    THE    CONSCIENCE 

We  point,  then,  to  the  adverse  sentence  of  the  conscience,  and 
ask  for  a  statement  of  the  circumstances  in  which  it  can  be  led  to 
withdraw  the  sentence  which  it  has  pronounced.  We  have  never 
seen  such  a  statement  clearly  and  distinctly  drawn  out;  and 
until  that  is  done,  we  must  continue  to  believe  that  the  conscience, 
acting  in  the  name  of  God,  continues  to  leave  its  awful  sentence 
upon  us,  without  giving  the  least  indication  of  an  escape.  And 
all  this  seems  implied  in  the  admission  that  we  have  committed 
so  much  as  one  action  condemned  by  the  conscience. 

But  there  is  a  farther,  and  a  more  difficult  and  delicate  inquiry 
to  be  made — in  regard  to  the  extent  of  human  sinfulness  as  de- 
clared by  the  moral  faculty. 

We  now  inquire,  in  the  second  place,  whether  the  conscience 
approves  of  a  single  state  of  the  mind  when  the  same  is  truly 
represented  ? 

In  making  this  inquiry,  it  will  be  needful  to  keep  in  view  some 
of  those  laws  of  the  operations  of  conscience  noticed  in  a  preced- 
ing section,  and  also  the  influence  which  the  will  exercises  upon 
the  representation  made  to  the  moral  faculty  of  any  given  action. 
We  must  remember  that  the  conscience  pronounces  its  verdict  of 
approval  or  disapproval,  not  upon  the  outward  act,  but  upon  the 
inward  state  of  the  agent,  and  that  it  judges  of  this  state  accord- 
ing to  the  representation  given  to  it.  Pains  must  be  taken,  then, 
in  submitting  any  action  to  the  decision  of  the  conscience,  to  sub- 
mit not  a  mere  bodily  act  but  a  mental  state  of  the  agent,  and  to 
submit  the  actual  mental  state.  If  the  real  state  of  the  agent's 
soul  is  not  laid  before  the  conscience,  the  conscience  may  give  far 
too  favorable  a  decision. 

The  difficulty  of  this  whole  investigation  lies  in  determining' 
the  precise  state  of  the  agent  at  any  given  time.  In  by  far  the 
greater  number  of  our  actions  possessed  of  moral  characteristics, 
the  motives,  direct  and  indirect,  immediate  and  ultimate,  are  very 
numerous  ;  and  the  whole  state  of  mind  is  very  complex,  and 
difficult  to  be  analyzed  into  its  elements.  When  there  have  been 
so  many  determining  feelings,  it  is  extremely  difficult  to  discover 
the  predominating  one ;  and  it  is  possible  that  it  may  lie  alto- 
gether concealed  in  the  complicated  folds  of  the  human  breast. 
When  there  is  such  a  complexity,  there  is  room  for  the  operation 
of  pride  and  vanity,  which  will  prompt  us  to  too  flattering  a  view 
of  the  motives  by  which  we  are  swayed  in  the  performance  of 
any  given  action.  When  the  outward  deed  is  agreeable  to  the 


UPON    THE    CHARACTER    OF   MAN.  355 

•common  rules  of  morality,  there  will  be  no  deep  or  searching  in- 
quiry into  the  real  spring  of  action  ;  and  when  the  action  seems  to 
be  opposed  to  the  letter  of  God's  law,  there  may  be  various  at- 
tempts to  disguise,  to  palliate,  and  excuse  the  internal  disposition 
from  which  it  springs. 

But  here,  we  shall  suppose,  is  an  individual  resolved  to  ascer- 
tain, in  the  light  of  his  conscience,  his  precise  moral  state,  being 
aware  meanwhile  of  the  deceitfulness  of  his  heart.  Bent  upon 
probing  the  wound  to  the  bottom,  he  goes  down  beneath  the  sur- 
face which  presents  itself  to  common  observation.  This  man  will 
soon  find  that  the  more  closely  he  investigates  his  heart  and  con- 
duct, it  is  the  more  difficult  to  arrive  at  felt  certainty.  The  diffi- 
culty which  he  experiences  arises,  not  so  much  from  a  want  of 
clearness  in  the  decisions  of  the  conscience  when  the  case  is  stated, 
as  in  determining  what  is  the  case  which  should  be  presented — 
that  is,  the  precise  motive  by  which  he  is  swayed,  and  the  actual 
state  of  his  mind  at  any  given  instant.  All  his  reflections  may 
tend  only  to  raise  up  doubts  ever  thickening,  and  to  land  him  in 
grosser  darkness.  Were  he  quite  sure  that  he  had  been  swayed 
by  pure  and  benevolent  motives  at  the  time  referred  to,  he  knows 
what  the  decision  of  the  moral  faculty  would  be  ;  but  the  more  he 
investigates,  and  the  greater  the  spirit  of  c.andor  by  which  he  is 
actuated  in  the  inquiry,  it  is  seen  to  be  the  more  difficult  to  deter- 
mine the  exact  influence  under  which  he  acted.  This  inquirer, 
in  very  proportion  to  his  honesty,  is  the  more  puzzled  and  con- 
founded ;  and  he  may  be  tempted  at  last,  as  he  feels  himself  beset 
by  increasing  difficulties,  to  take  one  of  two  courses — to  cease  from 
the  inquiry  altogether,  and  to  flatter  himself  with  the  thought, 
that  he  is  often  or  commonly  a  virtuous  agent ;  or  on  the  other 
hand,  to  abandon  himself  to  doubt,  distraction,  and  terror — and  as 
he  feels  the  painfulness  of  these  feelings,  to  betake  himself  to  super- 
stition, and  every  kind  of  bodily  exercise,  that  may  be  fitted  to 
deaden  or  delude  the  moral  sense.  One  or  other  of  the  results 
now  indicated,  has  commonly  been  the  issue  ;  an  uninquiring  self- 
satisfaction — or  an  uneasy  self-suspicion,  which  drives  the  individ- 
ual to  the  readiest  refuge  that  may  present  itself,  and  in  which  he 
may,  by  certain  acts  supposed  to  be  pleasing  to  God,  allay  the 
reproaches  by  which  he  is  troubled.  Such  is  the  issue  in  which 
conscience  lands  us — it  drives  us  to  thoughtlessness,  or  it  drives  us 
to  madness.  We  see  it  strikingly  exhibited  in  the  hearts  of  those 
whose  crimes  are  peculiarly  aggravated,  as  in  the  guilty  spend- 


366  JUDGMENTS    PRONOUNCED    BY    THE    CONSCIENCE 

thrift,  who  has  brought  multitudes  to  ruin — or  in  the  murderer, 
with  the  pangs  of  his  dying  victims  ever  rising  up  freshly  before  his 
mind ;  they  either  contrive  to  give  themselves  up  to  utter  uncon- 
cern, or  in  restless  and  feverish  discontent  they  pursue  every  super- 
stitious ceremony  which  may  hold  out  the  least  hope  of  appeasing 
the  God  whose  laws  they  have  broken. 

But  suppose  that  there  is  an  individual  sufficiently  earnest  to 
resist  all  the  allurements  which  would  turn  him  aside,  and  suf- 
ficiently enlightened  to  discover  the  inefficacy  of  superstitious  ob- 
servances, to  what  result  would  he  be  conducted?  He  would 
settle  down,  we  apprehend,  in  a  most  painful  uncertainty,  quite  con- 
scious that  sin  had  been  committed,  and  yet  ignorant  of  any  means 
by  which  sin  can  be  forgiven,  and  scarcely  knowing  whether  he  has 
ever  so  much  as  done  one  virtuous  act. 

It  seems  to  be  difficult  or  impossible,  then,  by  a  simple  direct  in- 
spection of  the  state  of  mind  at  any  given  time,  to  determine 
whether  it  is  truly  virtuous.  But  let  us  inquire,  whether  there 
may  not  be  certain  general  principles  which  guide  us  out  of  our 
uncertainty,  and  land  us  in  clear  and  distinct,  though  it  may  be 
very  humbling,  views  of  ourselves. 

And,  first,  it  is  a  general  principle,  that  the  mind,  in  judging 
of  a  responsibte  agent  at  any  given  time,  ought  to  take  into  view 
the  whole  state  of  the  mind.  It  ought  not  to  single  out  a  par- 
ticular part,  or  view  it  under  a  particular  aspect.  It  is  here,  as 
we  have  seen,  that  there  is  room  for  partiality  and  endless  de- 
lusion. The  conscience,  as  a  divinely  appointed  arbiter,  judges 
according  to  truth  ;  and  judges  not  so  much  the  act,  as  the  agent 
in  the  act;  and  if  it  judges  correctly  of  the  agent,  it  must  take 
into  view  his  whole  moral  state  and  motive. 

As  a  second  general  principle,  it  must  be  taken  into  account 
that  the  mental  state  of  the  agent  cannot  be  truly  good,  provided 
he  is  in  the  meantime  neglecting  a  known  and  manifest  duty. 
It  will  not  be  difficult  to  establish  this  principle,  which  is  a  neces- 
sary consequent  of  the  first ;  and  when  admitted,  the  two  include 
all  men  under  sin. 

Take  as  an  illustration,  a  boy  arrived  at  the  age  of  responsi- 
bility, running  away  from  his  parents,  without  provocation  of  any 
kind.  Very  possibly,  in  the  midst  of  the  companions  whom  he 
meets  with,  he  is  cheerful  and  kind  and  obliging.  Present  this 
disinterested  kindness  to  the  moral  faculty,  and  it  will  approve  it 
as  something  becoming ;  and  if  nothing  else  is  observed,  it  may 


UPON   THE    CHARACTER    OF    MAN.  357 

seem  as  if  he  merited  our  warmest  approbation.  But  present  the 
whole  complex  moral  state  of  the  boy  to  the  conscience,  and  the 
judgment  will  be  instantly  reversed.  As  long  as  this  child  is 
living  in  neglect  of  a  bounden  duty,  the  moral  sense  refuses  to  give 
a  single  mark  of  approval ;  and  all  his  kindness  will  not  draw  a 
single  smile  of  complacency  from  the  rightly  constituted  mind,  till 
such  time  as  the  child  shall  return  to  his  father's  house,  and  to 
proper  allegiance  to  those  who  are  set  over  him. 

Analogous  instances  will  present  themselves  to  the  reflecting 
mind.  A  person,  let  us  suppose,  has  unjustly  got  possession  of  a 
neighbor's  property.  It  is  conceivable,  that  having  done  sq,  he 
may  be  kind  and  benevolent  in  the  use  which  he  makes  of  his 
wealth;  and  his  hospitality  may  be  the  theme  of  admiration 
throughout  the  whole  neighborhood,  and  the  praise  of  his  chanty 
may  be  in  the  mouths  of  hundreds  of  the  destitute.  Now,  if  this 
individual's  original  dishonesty  is  not  established  on  sufficient  evi- 
dence, we  may  in  the  judgment  of  charity  give  him  credit  for  gen- 
erosity ;  but  when  the  whole  man  is  brought  under  our  notice,  the 
mind  can  give  one,  and  but  one  judgment,  and  that  is  to  condemn 
him,  even  when  he  is  at  the  head  of  his  own  hospitable  board, 
and  scattering  his  munificence  around  him  with  the  greatest  liber- 
ality. 

Or  take  the  case  of  a  Brazilian  sugar-planter  fitting  out  a  slave- 
ship,  with  instructions  to  the  crew  to  proceed  to  the  coast  of  Africa, 
to  seize  on  a  company  of  unoffending  negroes,  and  bring  them  as 
slaves  to  his  plantation.  He  makes  it  part  of  his  instructions, 
that  the  captives  shall  be  treated  with  great  lenity  on  the  voyage ; 
and  upon  their  landing,  he  does  everything  which  kindness  and 
consideration  can  prompt,  in  order  to  promote  their  comfort.  Now, 
present  the  one  side  of  this  man's  conduct  to  the  mind — let  a 
stranger  be  taken  rapidly  over  the  plantation,  and  let  him  see  the 
food  provided  for  the  slaves,  the  comfortable  dwellings  in  which 
they  reside,  and  the  amusements  allowed  them,  and  there  may  be 
a  sentence  of  approval  pronounced  ;  but  present  both  sides  of  his 
behavior,  and  the  sentence  will  assuredly  be  one  of  severe  repro- 
bation. 

A  husband  making  ample  temporal  provision  for  the  wife  cause- 
lessly forsaken,  and  the  libertine  lavishing  kindness  on  the  person 
whom  he  has  seduced,  and  with  whom  he  is  living  in  a  state  of 
sin — these  are  cases  in  point,  as  showing  how  the  conscience  might 
approve  of  a  moral  agent,  on  his  conduct  being  represented  only 


358  JUDGMENTS    PRONOUNCED    BY    THE    CONSCIENCE 

under  one  aspect,  and  yet  disapprove  of  it  when  brought  fully 
under  review  ;  and  showing,  too,  how  the  moral  faculty  cannot 
approve  of  an  agent,  even  when  doing  an  act  good  in  itself,  pro- 
vided he  is  in  a  bad  moral  state,  and  living  in  the  meanwhile  in 
neglect  of  a  clear  and  a  bounden  duty. 

History  presents  many  examples  of  such  a  mixture  of  motives. 
Lilienhorm  had  been  raised  from  obscurity  and  wretchedness  by 
Gustavus,  king  of  Sweden,  and  promoted  to  the  rank  of  com- 
mandant of  the  guard,  and  had  the  complete  confidence  of  his  sove- 
reign. But  when  a  conspiracy  was  formed  against  his  master,  he 
joined  it,  instigated  by  the  hope  held  out  to  him  of  commanding 
the  national  guard,  and  holding  in  his  hand  the  destinies  of  the 
kingdom.  Meanwhile  he  endeavored,  by  a  kind  of  compromise, 
to  keep  his  allegiance  to  the  king  his  benefactor.  He  wrote  him 
an  anonymous  letter,  informing  him  of  particulars,  which  must 
have  convinced  the  king  of  the  veracity  of  the  statement,  of  an 
unsuccessful  attempt  that  had  been  made  to  take  his  life  some 
time  before,  and  describing  the  plan  which  the  conspirators  had 
now  formed,  and  warning  him  against  going  to  a  particular  ball, 
where  the  assassination  was  to  be  committed.  In  this  way  he 
sought  to  satisfy  his  conscience,  when  it  threw  out  doubts  as  to 
the  propriety  of  the  course  which  he  was  pursuing.  He  spent  the 
evening  on  which  the  conspiracy  was  to  take  place  in  the  king's 
apartment,  saw  him  read  the  anonymous  letter  sent  him,  and  upon 
the  generous  and  headstrong  king  despising  the  warning,  he  fol- 
lowed him  to  the  ball,  and  was  present  when  he  was  shot.  Now, 
take  us  to  the  closet  of  this  man,  and  let  us  see  him  writing  this 
letter,  whieh  was  fitted  to  save  his  sovereign,  show  us  this  and  no 
more,  and  we  say,  how  becoming,  how  generous  !  but  let  us  follow 
him  through  the  whole  scenes,  and  we  change  our  tone,  and 
arraign  him  of  treachery  ;  and  we  do  so  at  the  very  instant  when 
he  writes  the  letter,  and  seems  most  magnanimous. 

By  the  help  of  these  principles,  we  are  enabled  to  bring  home 
the  sense  of  guilt  to  every  manrs  conscience ;  not  only  the  sense 
of  individual  sins,  but  of  constant  and  abiding  sinfulness.  When 
there  is  not  a  sin  of  commission,  there  is  a  sin  of  omission ;  when 
there  is  not  the  sin  of  excess,,  there  is  the  sin  of  defect. 

In  particular,  we  hold  that  every  human  soul  is  chargeable  with 
the  sin  of  ungodliness.  Other  sins  are  committed  by  individual 
men,  some  are  addicted  to  one  sin,  and  others  to  a  different  class 
of  sins ;  but  this  offence  seems  to  be  universal.  All  are  not  male- 


UPON    THE    CHARACTER    OF    MAN.  359 

volent  or  selfish  ;  all  are  not  intemperate  or  deceitful;  all  are  not 
proud  and  ambitious ;  but  all  seem  to  be  ungodly.  Other  sins 
may  be  only  occasional,  but  this  sin  seems  to  be  perpetual  and 
abiding;  and  rendering  all  men  guilty  at  all  times,  even  when 
they  are  cherishing  thoughts  and  feelings  which  in  themselves  are 
praiseworthy.  Does  any  man  stand  up  and  say,  I  was  in  a  virtu- 
ous state,  at  such  and  such  a  time,  when  I  was  defending  the  help- 
less, and  relieving  the  destitute  ?  We  admit  at  once,  that  these 
actions  in  themselves  are  becoming,  as  becoming  as  those  of  the  dis- 
obedient son  showing  kindness  to  his  companions ;  of  the  unjust  man 
showing  hospitality  ;  of  the  slaveholder  supplying  his  slaves  with 
excellent  food ;  or  of  the  husband  providing  handsomely  for  a 
wife  abandoned ;  or  of  the  conspirator  sending  a  notice  fitted  to 
thwart  the  conspiracy  to  which  he  was  a  party.  If  we  could 
judge  these  acts  apart  from  the  agent,  we  would  unhesitatingly 
approve  of  them.  Nay,  we  do  approve  of  the  acts,  but  we  never 
for  one  instant  approve  of  the  agent.  Before  we  can  approve  of 
the  disobedient  son,  but  kind  companion,  he  must  return  to  his 
obedience  ;  of  the  unjust  philanthropist,  he  must  restore  the  fruits 
of  his  iniquity  ;  of  the  slaveholder,  he  must  undo  his  deed  ;  before 
we  can  approve  of  the  unfaithful  husband  in  his  kindness,  he  must 
return  to  the  society  of  his  wife;  of  the  notice  sent  by  the  con- 
spirator, he  must  first  disconnect  himself  entirely  and  openly  from 
the  conspiracy ;  and  in  like  manner,  before  we  can  approve  tho- 
roughly of  man,  even  in  his  generosity,  we  must  find  him  returning 
to  his  allegiance  to  God,  making  confession  of  his  past  sin,  hum- 
bling himself  before  him  whom  he  has  offended,  and  acknowledg- 
ing that  the  very  gifts  which  he  is  about  to  bestow  come  from  God, 
the  author  of  all  his  blessings. 

As  godliness  is  a  constant  duty,  so  ungodliness,  habitually 
cherished,  is  a  great  master-sin,  reaching  over  the  whole  man ; 
and  like  the  dead  fly  in  the  apothecary's  ointment,  contaminating 
the  whole  service  paid,  however  proper  it  may  be  in  itself.  Does 
it  not  look  as  if  an  ungodly  man  could  not  do  a  truly  virtuous  act  ? 
Does  it  not  look  as  if  man  must  first  be  made  godly,  before  he  can 
do  an  act  truly  good?  "Either  make  the  tree  good,  and  his  fruit 
good ;  or  else  make  the  tree  corrupt,  and  his  fruit  corrupt." 


360  INQUIRY    INTO    THE    VIRTUOUSNESS 


SECTION  IV.— FARTHER   INQUIRY   INTO   THE   VIRTUOUSNESS,   AND 
MORE  PARTICULARLY  THE  GODLINESS  OF  MAN'S  CHARACTER. 

It  is  extremely  difficult  for  us,  in  our  present  circumstances  and 
with  our  present  prejudices,  to  form,  by  observation  alone,  an  im- 
partial estimate  of  the  human  character.  Prejudices  intervene  to 
obscure  our  view,  both  when  we  examine  others  and  ourselves. 
On  looking  around,  we  find  ourselves  in  the  heart  of  a  crowd  of 
persons  and  events  so  involved  with  one  another,  and  with  us,  that 
we  cannot  easily  form  an  enlarged  conception  of  them.  What  a 
mass  of  beings  spring  up  before  us  when  we  would  survey  the 
world ;  and  these  with  feelings,  with  habits,  and  dispositions  so 
varied  ;  some  mild,  others  passionate ;  some  gifted  with  lofty  pow- 
ers of  understanding,  others  incapable  of  rising  above  the  ordinary 
details  of  life ;  some  who  seem  to  be  looking  forward  to  another 
world,  and  others  living  as  if  they  were  to  live  here  for  ever,  or  as 
if  their  souls  were  to  go  down  with  their  bodies  to  the  grave,  and 
be  buried  in  the  same  tomb.  We  are,  moreover,  personally  con- 
nected with  many  of  the  events  that  are  occurring ;  some  are 
looked  to  with  hope,  as  about  to  bring  us  friends  or  fortune ;  others 
with  fear,  as  threatening  to  plunge  us  into  the  depths  of  adversity. 
Then  there  are  a  thousand  ties  connecting  us  with  the  men  around 
us;  to  this  one  we  are  joined  by  the  bond  of  relationship;  to  this 
other  by  the  ties  of  business ;  and  with  a  third,  we  have  passed 
many  a  pleasant  and  profitable  hour.  In  short,  we  are  so  inti- 
mately connected  with  all  around  us,  and  all  around  us  is  so  in- 
volved, that  we  are  constantly  liable,  in  our  judgments  of  human 
character,  to  be  warped  by  human  prepossessions,  or  at  least  to 
become  bewildered  and  confused. 

The  better  way  to  form  a  true  estimate  of  the  moral  character 
of  man  is  to  examine  ourselves.  But  then,  many  are  afraid  to 
examine  themselves  lest  hideous  sights  sbould  start  up.  And 
when  mankind  have  the  courage  to  examine  themselves,  prejudice 
dims  the  eyes,  vanity  distorts  the  object  seen,  the  treacherous 
memory  brings  up  only  the  fair  and  flattering  side  of  the  picture, 
and  the  deceived  judgment  denies  the  sinful  action,  explains  away 
the  motives,  or  excuses  the  deed  in  the  circumstances. 

It  appears,  then,  that  we  are  too  near  the  object  examined  to 
obtain  an  expanded  view,  and  too  personally  connected  with  it  to 
form  an  impartial  estimate.  We  are  much  in  the  same  condition 
as  a  person  acting  in  the  heart  of  a  crowd  of  bustling  beings,  or 


AND    GODLINESS    OF    MANJS    CHARACTER.  361 

as  a  common  soldier  in  the  heart  of  a  battle,  we  see  only  a  few 
objects,  and  have  no  enlarged  or  defined  conception  of  the  whole. 
In  order  to  obtain  a  general  view  of  the  crowd  or  of  the  battle, 
the  person  must  ascend  some  eminence,  whence  he  may  see  the 
whole  lying  below  and  before  him.  And  is  it  not  possible  to  reach 
an  eminence  whence  we  may  survey  human  nature  far  above 
these  passions,  prejudices,  and  narrow  interests  which  do  so  con- 
fine and  confound  us  ?  We  would  certainly  be  less  likely  to  err 
if  we  could  obtain  a  view  of  this  world  from  some  higher  region, 
so  clear  that  all  things  could  be  seen  as  they  are,  and  so  far  re- 
moved from  the  earth  that  nearness  would  not  delude  us. 

Let  us,  then,  in  imagination,  ascend  such  an  eminence.  We 
are  to  rise  higher  than  Moses  when  he  ascended  Mount  Sinai  to 
converse  With  God ; — on  that  mountain  the  thunders  and  clouds 
distracted  the  spirit  and  obscured  the  view.  We  are  to  ascend 
higher  than  that  Mount  Nebo  whence  he  descried  the  land  of 
promise ;  from  that  mountain  he  saw  only  one  land — we  must 
ascend  an  eminence  whence  we  can  see  the  whole  earth.  We 
are  to  mount  to  a  height  like  that  high  mountain  to  which  Satan 
carried  Jesus,  when  he  showed  him  the  whole  kingdoms  of  the 
world,  and  the  glory  of  them ;  but  with  this  only  difference,  that 
we  may  have  to  behold  the  shame  rather  than  the  glory  of  these 
kingdoms.  We  are  to  rise  to  those  third  heavens  whither  Paul 
was  carried,  whether  in  the  body  or  out  of  the  body  he  knew  not; 
to  that  place  seen  by  John,  which  had  no  need  of  the  sun,  neither 
of  the  moon  to  shine  in  it,  for  the  glory  of  God  enlightens  it.  We 
are  to  mount,  in  short,  to  that  heaven  in  which  the  Divinity  sits 
enthroned,  and  whence  he  is  represented  as  looking  down  to  judge 
the  world.  "  God  looked  down  from  Heaven  upon  the  children 
of  men  to  see  if  there  were  any  that  did  understand,  that  did  seek 
God." 

As  we  leave  the  earth  in  this  flight  of  faith,  all  the  objects  of  it 
will  become  more  and  more  insignificant.  The  earthly  property 
coveted  so  eagerly,  mark  how  it  shrinks  till  it  becomes  scarcely 
discernible.  The  proud  citadels  of  the  earth,  its  magnificent  pal- 
aces and  populous  cities,  the  thrones,  and  dominions,  and  exten- 
sive empires  won  by  boasted  conquest  followed  by  splendid  triumph, 
behold  how  they  diminish  till  they  appear  like  the  small  dust  of 
the  balance :  and  these  isles  in  which  we  live,  with  their  vaunted 
trade,  and  arts,  and  commerce,  their  ships  which  visit  every  shore 
and  creek  of  the  ocean,  appear  as  a  very  little  thing.  Meanwhile, 


362  INQUIRY    INTO    THE    VIRTUOUSNESS 

we  are  gradually  removing  from  the  sympathies,  the  feelings,  the 
prejudices  of  the  race ;  one  after  another,  of  the  network  of  cords 
that  connects  us  with  the  earth  are  broken  or  loosened,  and  we 
have  now  no  longer  an  interest  in  the  petty  feuds  and  parties  into 
which  mankind  are  divided,  and  our  views  widen  with  the  wide 
horizon  stretching  out  around  us.  We  now  draw  near  the  courts 
which  surround  the  inner  sanctuary  of  the  Most  High.  As  we 
get  a  nearer  and  fuller  view  of  that  throne,  "to  look  upon  as  a 
jasper  and  a  sardine  stone,  and  in  sight  like  unto  an  emerald  "- 
the  lustre  of  earthly  greatness  grows  dim,  and  its  honors  fade. 
As  we  hear  the  music  of  heaven,  and  angels  harping  with  their 
harps,  and  singing  with  their  voice,  and  the  sound,  like  the  sound 
of  many  waters,  and  the  subject  of  their  song,  not  the  triumph  of 
one  sinful  tyrant  over  another,  but  the  triumphs  of  benevolence 
and  grace,  then  all  human  contests  seem  to  us  harsh  as  discord 
sounds  after  harmony.  As  we  turn  to  that  Fountain  of  Lights, 
in  whom  is  no  darkness  at  all,  the  brightest  earthly  glory  seems 
dim,  as  every  other  object  seems  dark  after  gazing  at  the  full 
splendor  of  the  noon-day  sun.  When  we  would  gaze  upon  him 
who  dwelleth  in  light  which  is  inaccessible  to  mortal  eyes,  all 
other  objects  fade  from  our  view,  as  the  stars  go  out  before  the  full 
blaze  of  sunrise.  But  our  eyes  are  dazzled  with  the  light,  before 
which  even  cherubim  vail  their  faces  with  their  wings,  and  for  re- 
lief we  turn  towards  the  earth  which  we  left  far  beneath  us ;  and 
having  seen  heaven,  and  angels,  and  God  himself,  we  now  look 
down  to  inquire  into  the  character  of  man.  Our  judgment  from 
such  a  point  of  view,  we  venture  to  affirm,  will  be  the  same  with 
that  of  God.  "God  looked  down  from  heaven  upon  the  children 
of  men  to  see  if  there  were  any  that  did  understand,  that  did  seek 
God.  Every  one  of  them  is  gone  back,  they  are  altogether  be- 
come filthy  ;  there  is  none  that  doeth  good,  no,  not  one." 

It  is  from  this  point  of  view  that  we  are  now  to  survey  mankind. 
In  doing  so  we  shall  find,  first  of  all,  that  all  men  are  on  much 
the  same  level.  We  divide  mankind  into  the  virtuous  and  the 
vicious,  the  good  and  the  bad.  And  we  do  not  deny  that  there 
are  differences  between  one  man  and  another,  and  one  class  of 
men  and  another,  in  respect  of  their  moral  condition.  Still,  if  we 
take  a  sufficiently  high  standard,  we  shall  see  that,  while  there 
are  differences,  there  are  far  more  important  points  of  resemblance. 
When  we  ascend  a  very  high  mountain,  and  take  a  view  of  the 
ground  lying  below  us,  we  find  the  lesser  hills,  which  may  have 


AND   GODLINESS    OF    MAN'S    CHARACTER.  363 

appeared  of  considerable  magnitude  when  looked  at  from  beneath, 
Decoming  more  and  more  insignificant,  till  at  length  the  whole 
landscape  of  little  hills  and  valleys  stretches  out  before  us  as  a 
level  plain.  Now,  did  we  but  look  upon  mankind  and  human 
nature  from  the  height  of  God's  law,  we  would  be  less  impressed 
with  the  difference  between  this  man  arid  this  other  man,  and  see 
more  clearly  how  much  they  are,  after  all,  on  the  same  level. 
"  There  is  no  difference,  for  all  have  sinned,  and  come  short  of 
the  glory  of  God." 

Contemplating  mankind  from  this  point  of  view,  we  are  now  to 
inquire  what  are  the  virtuous  qualities  which  they  possess.  Man's 
favorable  estimate  of  his  character  arises  from  his  looking  at  him- 
self from  a  wrong  point ;  in  short,  he  takes  a  low  and  imperfect 
standard.  In  order  to  judge  correctly,  we  must  take  the  law  of 
God,  and  apply  it  to  his  heart  and  conduct.  Having  in  the  last 
section  taken  a  survey  of  man's  moral  nature,  as  the  same  can  be 
gathered  from  the  intimations  of  conscience,  we  are  now  to  use 
not  the  faculty  that  judges,  so  much  as  the  law  by  which  it  judges  ; 
and  taking  with  us  proper  views  of  the  nature  of  virtue,  and  of 
the  qualities  that  constitute  it,  we  are  to  inquire  into  the  character 
and  extent  of  the  good  or  evil  qualities  which  man  possesses. 

In  doing  so,  it  is  needful  to  take  along  with  us  the  important 
principle,  that  virtue  consists  essentially  in  the  will  following  the 
dictates  of  the  law  fixed  for  its  regulation.  Sin,  on  the  other  hand, 
consists  in  the  will  refusing  submission  to  -the  law,  or,  in  other 
words,  in  the  mind,  in  its  voluntary  acts,  taking  some  other  rule 
than  the  rule  which  is  prescribed  to  it. 

Proceeding  on  these  principles,  it  will  at  once  appear  that  the 
morally  good  does  not  consist  in  the  possession  of  feeling  or  affec- 
tion. Love  is  not  the  only  element  in  the  good.  There  may  be 
positive  vice  in  misdirected  love.  The  sinfulness  of  man's  char- 
acter consists  essentially  in  the  circumstance  that  his  will  is  not 
under  the  direction  of  the  law  of  God,  and  his  feeling  and  his  love 
may  become  in  the  highest  degree  sinful  when  set  on  improper 
objects.  It  is  not  the  possession  of  affection  which  renders  any 
man  morally  good,  but  it  is  affection  justly  regulated,  and  directed 
to  proper  objects,  and  in  due  measure. 

The  circumstance  that  man  possesses  affection  is  no  proof  of  the 
purity  of  his  nature.  We  hold  it  capable,  indeed,  of  being  demon- 
strated by  the  strongest  evidence  that  man  is  possessed  of  disinter- 
ested affection.  Are  there  not  amabilities,  and  sympathies,  and 


» 

364  INQUIRY    INTO    THE    VIRTUOUSNESS 

tendernesses,  constantly  shown  by  mankind  towards  each  other  ? 
Is  there  a  man  who  has  never  received  such  kindness  from  a 
fellow-creature  ? — it  is  most  assuredly  because,  by  his  rudeness  or 
selfishness,  he  has  repelled  it.  The  person  who  would  maintain 
of  all  and  each  of  mankind  that  they  are  utterly  selfish,  that  they 
possess  no  other  quality  but  a  cold  and  calculating  self-love,  such 
a  man  is  shutting  his  eyes  to  human  characteristics  which  fall 
under  our  view  every  day  in  our  intercourse  with  our  fellow-men. 
But  we  maintain  that  the  mere  possession,  or  the  lavishing  of  these 
affections,  does  not  constitute  the  race  morally  good.  Some  of  the 
most  vicious  among  mankind  have  been  distinguished  for  their 
great  sensibility — a  sensibility  abused  by  them,  however,  and  so 
the  means  of  spreading  the  evil  the  wider,  just  as  when  corrup- 
tion begins  in  vegetable  life  its  progress  becomes  the  more  rapid, 
and  the  more  fatal,  in  proportion  to  the  richness  of  the  vegetation. 

Besides  the  mere  benevolence,  there  is  needed,  in  order  to  con- 
stitute a  virtuous  character,  a  regulating  power  of  justice.  Two 
things  are  needful  to  the  beauty  and  beneficence  of  that  star  which 
shines  in  the  expanse.  There  is  its  light,  and  there  is  the  regu- 
larity of  its  movement  in  its  allotted  course.  Conceive  this  star, 
while  retaining  the  former  of  these  qualities,  to  lose  the  latter — it 
might,  in  its  now  wayward  career  through  the  heavens,  carry 
along  with  it  dismay  and  trouble  to  every  world  which  it  ap- 
proached, and  that  just  because  its  fire  was  still  unextinguished. 
There  is  still,  we  acknowledge,  light  flashing  from  man's  char- 
acter as  from  a  star,  but  it  is  as  from  a  wandering  star,  whose 
progress  we  view  with  anxiety  and  alarm. 

Man's  sinfulness,  in  so  far  as  affection  is  concerned,  consists, 
first,  in  an  ill-regulated  love,  and,  secondly,  in  a  defect  of  love, 
using  love  in  its  highest  acceptation  as  denoting  something  more 
than  mere  sensibility,  as  implying  wish  and  desire.  The  former 
of  these  we  hold  to  be  the  first,  in  the  order  of  nature  and  of 
succession.  There  is  first  some  strong  wish,  or  desire,  or  purpose, 
contrary  to  the  fixed  law,  and  then  there  comes  to  be  a  drying  up 
of  love  altogether  in  rega*rd  to  some  of  its  exercises.  To  use  once 
more  our  illustration,  the  star  first  wanders  from  its  path,  and  gives, 
in  consequence,  its  light  and  heat  to  objects  different  from  those 
which  its  beams  were  meant  to  irradiate,  and  then  losing,  as  it 
wanders  farther  off,  its  light  and  heat  altogether — it  departs  into 
the  blackness  of  darkness  for  ever. 

We  find  both  these  elements  meeting  in  what  we  reckon  as 


AND    GODLINESS    OF    MAN'S    CHARACTER.  365 

the  first  and  great  leading  form  of  creature  sinfulness — the  sin  of 
ungodliness. 

We  have  said  that  in  order  to  determine  what  is  the  character 
of  man,  we  must  bring  the  law  of  God  to  bear  upon  it  in  all  its 
purity,  that  law  which  adjusts  itself  into  the  form  of  supreme  love 
to  God,  and  equitable  love  to  a  neighbor. 

Now,  take  this  law,  as  exhibiting  itself  in  the  first  of  these  for- 
mulas, and  requiring  supreme  love  to  God,  and  let  us  examine 
man's  character  by  it.  Herein  it  is,  that  we  are  enabled  to  con- 
vince every  man  of  sin.  We  charge  every  given  man  with  the 
sin  of  ungodliness,  and  we  do  so  by  means  of  the  law  of  right  and 
wrong. 

The  circumstance  has  often  been  observed  and  dwelt  on  by 
divines,  that  ungodliness  is  the  great  leading  sin  of  humanity.  It 
has  not  been  noticed  so  frequently,  if  at  all,  how  it  should  have 
come  to  be  so.  The  train  of  observation  we  have  been  pursuing 
conducts  us,  if  we  do  not  mistake,  to  the  true  and  an  adequate 
explanation.  There  are  obvious  reasons  why  a  sinful  creature 
should  not  relish  a  nearness  of  approach  to,  or  even  so  much  as  to 
meditate  upon,  a  God  whom  he  has  so  grievously  offended.  It  is 
not  difficult  to  see  how  ungodliness  should  come,  from  this  cause, 
to  be  the  leading  exhibition  of  human  sinfulness — how  it  may  be- 
come the  distinguishing  characteristic  of  all  fallen  creatures. 

Alcibiades  thus  expresses  his  feelings  in  reference  to  Socrates : — 
"  I  stop  my  ears,  therefore,  as  from  the  syrens,  and  flee  away  as 
fast  as  possible,  that  I  may  not  sit  down  beside  him,  and  grow  old 
in  listening  to  his  talk ;  for  this  man  has  reduced  me  to  feel  the 
sentiment  of  blame,which  I  imagine  no  one  could  readily  believe 
was  in  me  ;  he  alone  inspires  me  with  remorse  and  awe,  for  I  feel 
in  his  presence  my  incapacity  of  refuting  what  he  says,  or  of  re- 
fusing to  do  that  which  he  directs  :  but  when  I  depart  from  him, 
the  glory  which  the  multitude  confers  overwhelms  me.  I  escape, 
therefore,  and  hide  myself  from  him,  and  when  I  see  him  I  am 
overwhelmed  with  humiliation,  because  I  have  neglected  to  do 
what  I  have  confessed  ought  to  be  done,  arid  often  have  I  wished 
that  he  were  no  longer  to  be  seen  among  men."  If  such  an  effect 
was  produced — if  such  were  the  wishes  excited  by  near  contact 
with  the  excellence  of  Socrates — how  much  more  overwhelming 
must  be  the  idea  of  the  unspotted  purity  of  God  to  a  man  conscious 
©f  guilt?  Hence  the  inclination  of  mankind,  owing  to  the  " hu- 
miliation" with  which  his  presence  overwhelms  them,  "  not  to  sit 


366 '  INQUIRY  INTO  THE  VIRTUOUSNESS 

beside  God,"  but  rather  to  "  flee  from  him  as  fast  as  possible,"  "to 
hide  themselves  from  him  ;"  nay,  at  times  to  wish  that  tnere  was 
no  God,  or  no  such  God,  to  take  a  holy  cognizance  of  their  conduct. 

Multitudes,  we  are  aware,  are  so  far  ignorant  of  the  existence 
of  this  enmity,  that  they  have  not  so  much  as  confessed  it  to 
themselves.  And  it  is  to  be  acknowledged,  that  there  are  persons 
in  whom  it  is  to  some  extent  dormant ;  or  in  whom,  at  least,  it  is 
not  at  all  times  called  forth  and  excited  in  an  active  and  positive 
manner.  But  even  when  there*  is  not  the  bursting  flame,  there 
may  be  the  smouldering  embers.  The  following  illustration  may 
help  us  to  understand  this.  It  is  conceivable  that  a  person  might 
really  entertain  a  repugnance  to  us  in  the  depths  of  his  heart,  and 
yet  this  feeling  not  be  in  constant  activity.  As  long  as  we  are  at 
a  distance  from  him,  and  when  there  is  nothing  to  recall  the  rec- 
ollection of  our  persons  or  actions  to  his  mind,  he  might,  in  the 
busy  pursuit  of  his  usual  avocations,  forget  us  for  a  time,  during 
which  his  enmity  would  so  far  be  in  a  slumbering  state.  But 
when  we  come  into  his  presence,  and  whenever  we  happen  to  do 
anything,  it  may  be  most  unwittingly,  fitted  to  humble  his  pride, 
or  ruffle  him  in  his  ruling  passion,  then  the  enmity  will  boil,  and 
rage,  and  break  forth  with  greater  or  less  violence,  according  to 
the  character  of  the  individual.  Now,  of  this  same  description  is 
the  enmity  of  man's  heart  towards  God.  Its  most  common  mani- 
festation is  an  habitual  or  studious  forgetfulness  of  God.  As  much 
as  within  him  lies,  he  contrives  to  keep  away  the  very  thought  of 
God  from  his  mind,  because  it  is  a  thought  that  troubles  him. 
There  is  nothing  in  the  contemplation  of  a  righteous  God  to  flat- 
ter his  vanity,  and  much  to  check  and  reprove  him  ;  and  he  pre- 
fers to  engross  himself  with  the  business  of  life,  or  the  pleasures  of 
the  world.  When  Palamedes  came  to  Ithaca,  to  invite  Ulysses  to 
join  in  the  expedition  against  Troy,  the  latter,  unwilling  to  en* . 
gage  in  the  undertaking,  betook  himself  to  ploughing  the  sand, 
and  sowing  salt,  on  the  pretence  of  being  visited  with  insanity. 
There  are  multitudes  as  insane  as  Ulysses,  who  betake  themselves 
to  works  as  insane,  and  all  in  the  way  of  pretence,  to  excuse  them- 
selves from  the  performance  of  the  immediate  duties  which  they 
owe  to  God. 

Sometimes,  no  doubt,  notwithstanding  of  his  general  unwilling- 
ness to  contemplate  God,  man  is  all  but  compelled  to  think  of  him 
by  the  circumstances  in  which  he  is  placed  ;  but  when  the  thought 
comes  into  his  mind,  he  banishes  it  with  all  available  haste,  as 


AND   GODLINESS    OF   MAN'S   CHARACTER.  367 

the  Gadarenes  beseeched  Jesus  to  depart  from  their  coasts,  when 
they  found  that  in  consequence  of  his  visit,  a  portion  of  their 
property  kept  by  them  contrary  to  the  law  of  Moses  which  they 
professed  to  reverence,  had  been  destroyed.  Under  some  impulse 
of  feeling,  in  the  hour  of  deep  grief  and  disappointment,  and  in  the 
apprehension  of  overhanging  judgments,  he  betakes  himself  to 
God,  and  calls  up  the  remembrance  of  his  name  from  the  oblivion 
to  which  it  had  been  consigned ;  but  as  God  stands  before  him  in 
awful  majesty,  he  is  as  awe-struck  as  were  Saul  and  the  Witch  of 
Endor,  when  Samuel  actually  appeared  to  them ;  and  he  would 
flee  from  the  presence  of  the  Lord,  through  whom  he  is  reminded 
only  of  his  sins,  and  not  of  what  might  be  far  more  pleasant,  of  hia 
attainments  and  imagined  virtues.  In  some  other  cases,  he  may 
cling  to  the  thought  of  God  still  more  fondly,  and  for  a  greater 
length  of  time,  as  eagerly  indeed  as  the  Philistines  seized  the  ark 
of  God,  and  carried  it  into  the  temple  of  Dagon  ;  but  he  soon  loses 
his  desire  for  so  near  an  approach  to  God,  when  he  finds  it  incon- 
sistent with  the  evil  desire  of  his  corrupted  heart,  just  as  the  Phil- 
istines banished  the  ark  of  God,  when  it  threw  down  their  idols 
and  afflicted  their  cities.  The  great  majority  of  mankind  come 
at  last  to  learn  the  art  too  easily  learned  by  depraved  man,  that 
of  living  without  God  in  the  world,  "  and  God  is  not  in  all  their 
thoughts." 

True,  when  men  succeed  in  obtaining  a  false  view  of  God,  when 
they  are  enabled  to  look  upon  him  as  one  who  can  overlook  their 
failings,  and  cherish  and  countenance  them  in  their  sins,  they 
will  think  of  him  more  frequently,  and  pay  him  a  willing  homage. 
It  is  thus  that  we  account  for  man's  inclination  to  Polytheism  and 
idolatry  in  the  earlier  ages  of  the  world,  and  the  simpler  stages  of 
society  ;  and  it  is  thus,  too,  that  we  are  to  account  for  the  tend- 
ency of  mankind  in  the  more  cultivated  nations,  and  in  the  present 
day,  to  divest  God  of  his  holiness,  or  to  sink  the  idea  of  his  law 
and  government.  We  regard  these  prevailing  inclinations  as  a 
proof  of  the  deeply-seated  carnal  enmity  of  the  heart  towards 
God — that  is,  towards  a  holy  God — that  is,  towards  the  existing 
God. 

But  so  far  as  mankind  entertain  speculatively  correct  views  of 
the  character  of  God,  their  antipathy  shows  itself  in  an  habitual 
forgetfulness.  They  forget  God  so  studiously,  just  because  they 
feel  no  pleasure  in  contemplating  him.  And  the  question  arises, 
How  does  it  happen  that  they  feel  no  pleasure  in  contemplating' 


368  INQUIRY    INTO    THE    VIRTUOUSNESS 

that  God,  who  calls  forth  the  constant  admiration  and  praise  of 
all  holy  beings  throughout  the  universe?  Plainly,  because  of 
some  deeply-seated  ungodliness  which  keens  them  from  seeing  the 
loveliness  which  all  others  admire. 

Then  there  are  times  when  this  enmity  appears  in  a  more  open 
and  offensive  form.  Whenever  God  is  forced  upon  the  attention, 
his  claims  asserted,  and  the  unsettled  accounts  between  him  and 
the  sinner  fully  written  out  and  presented  to  view,  then  the  dor- 
mant antipathy  is  called  into  action — the  seemingly  dead  snake 
is  warmed  into  vitality,  and  is  ready  to  inflict  its  sting.  The  vol- 
cano has  all  along  been  burning  in  the  depths  of  the  heart,  and  it 
is  now  ready  to  burst  out.  The  spirit  now  feels  the  enmity,  pos- 
sibly expresses  it,  perhaps  acts  upon  it.  The  very  thought  of 
God  is  positively  painful,  as  painful  as  the  presence  of  the  man's 
worst  enemy.  Not  unfrequently  the  bitterness  of  the  heart  will 
vent  itself  in  blasphemy  ;  rendering  it  needful,  that  wherever  a  holy 
religion  is  proclaimed,  there  should  be  in  it  a  positive  prohibition, 
in  reference  to  taking  God's  name  in  vain.  Not  unfrequently  it 
will  manifest  itself  in  prompting  mankind  to  mar  all  that  may  be 
thought  dear  to  God,  to  oppose  all  that  may  claim  to  have  his 
sanction,  and  deface  all  that  bears  his  name  and  image.  The 
fires  of  persecution  are  now  lighted,  being  kindled  at  that  fire 
which  is  burning  within  the  bosom,  but  which,  as  it*  cannot  reach 
God,  is  directly  against  all  that  may  be  supposed  to  represent  him, 
or  possess  his  authority. 

We  are  apt  to  wonder  at  the  excessive  wickedness  of  the  ancient 
Jews  at  certain  eras  in  their  history,  and  their  tendency  to  idolatry 
in  the  midst  of  the  light  which  they  enjoyed.  Possibly  we  may 
find  an  explanation  in  the  very  number  and  nature  of  the  privi- 
leges possessed  by  them.  They  may  have  felt  that  God  was  too 
near  them — that  the  light  was  too  oppressive  ;  and  hence  their 
disposition  to  retreat  to  darkened  groves,  in  which  a  false  worship 
transacted  its  rights.  We  suspect,  in  particular,  that  it  was  the 
very  propinquity  and  purity  of  the  holiness  of  Jesus  that  so  irri- 
tated the  spirit  of  his  persecutors.  We  may  account,  on  the  same 
principle,  for  the  circumstance,  not  unfrequently  occurring,  of  the 
son  of  pious  parents,  educated  in  a  religious  home,  hating  all  that 
is  spiritual  with  a  malignity  above  that  of  other  men.  If  not  dis- 
posed to  yield  to  it,  he  will  just  loathe  it  all  the  more  from  the 
contests  which  he  has  had  with  it.  And  hence,  also,  the  opposi- 
tion to  spiritual  truth  on  the  part  of  some  on  whom  it  has  been 


AND    GODLINESS    OP    MAN7S    CHARACTER.  369 

earnestly  pressed.  Those  who  have  long  resisted  it  will  come 
positively  to  nauseate  it,  as  the  wicked  do  a  faithful  monitor  who 
speaks  plainly  of  their  faults.  "  I  hate  him,  for  he  doth  not  pro- 
phesy good  concerning  me,  but  evil." 

We  need  not  dwell  upon  the  greatness  and  enormity  of  such  a 
sin  as  that  now  referred  to.  Not  only  is  it  a  great  sin  in  itself,  it 
is  a  master-passion,  a  propensity  reaching  over  the  whole  man, 
and  over  the  whole  man  at  all  times,  and  rendering  his  verv  heart 
and  character  ungodly.  Now,  as  long  as  this  ungodliness  is  in 
his  bosom,  whether  in  a  slumbering  or  more  active  state,  whether 
merely  burning  within  or  boiling  out,  we  cannot  say  of  man  that 
he  is  truly  good. 

And  let  us  observe  in  this  ungodliness  the  manifestation  of 
these  two  elements,  and  in  the  order  now  named — first,  a  rebellion 
against  a  law.  and,  secondly,  a  drying  up  of  the  affection. 

Now,  this  sin  of  ungodliness  is  the  sin  with  which  we  charge 
all  men,  and  there  are  other  sins  of  which  individual  men  are 
guilty.  These  sins  vary  much  in  the  case  of  different  persons. 
In  all  of  these  we  may  observe  the  first  of  the  elements  now  re- 
ferred to,  the  breaking  of  a  law,  and  in  the  most  of  them  a  defect 
of  love  or  benevolence.  First  the  affection  bursts  forth  from  its 
channel,  and  then  it  is  dried  up  altogether  in  the  sandy  desert 
over  which  it  now  flows. 

Such  is  the  general  truth  which  we  regard  as  conclusively 
forced  upon  the  inquirer  by  a  survey  of  the  qualities  of  man's 
moral  nature.  The  doctrine,  that  man  is  depraved,  seems  to  be 
established,  but  with  several  important  limitations. 

First  in  the  way  of  limitation,  it  is  proper  to  observe  that 
mankind  have  still  much  gentleness  and  amability,  and  other 
qualities  implying  a  heart  susceptible  of  love.  It  is  only  the 
more  to  be  regretted  that  this  love  should  not  be  directed  to  God. 
Even  as  regards  man,  this  love  is  commonly  perverted  and  mis- 
directed, and  is  apt  to  be  destroyed  by  a  growing  malignity,  or 
dried  up  by  a  confirmed  selfishness  and  indifference ;  but  in  the 
breasts  of  many  this  love  dwells  as  in  a  fountain,  and  is  ever 
ready  to  flow  out. 

Secondly,  in  the  way  of  limitation,  it  is  needful  to  bear  in 
mind  that  every  particular  kind  of  sin  is  not  practised  by  every 
man,  or  natural  to  every  man.  There  is,  we-  have  seen,  at 
least  one  form  of  sin  which  is  common  to  all  men,  but  there  are 
other  kinds  of  sin  which  are  peculiar  to  some  men,  one  man  being 

24 


INQUIRY  INTO  THE  VIRTUOITSNESS 

inclined  to  pride,  another  addicted  to  intemperance,  and  a  third  dis- 
tinguished by  his  selfish  attention  to  his  own  interests  and 
comforts. 

Every  man  is  liable  to  sin,  just  as  every  man  is  liable  to  disease 
and  death.  But  in  how  many  different  ways  may  death  come, 
and  by  the  instrumentality  of  what  a  vast  number  of  diseases  ! 
Sometimes  it  comes  upon  mankind  insensibly,  by  the  slow  progress 
of  consumption ;  at  other  times  it  dries  up  the  strength  by  the 
heat  of  fever,  or  lays  its  victim  at  once  prostrate  by  the  stroke  of 
paralysis.  Now,  just  as  the  death  which  reigns  over  all  comes  in 
a  variety  of  ways,  so  the  sin  which  rules  over  all  exhibits  itself  in 
a  great  diversity  of  forms ;  and  we  might  as  well  seek  to  number 
the  diseases  to  which  our  frame  is  incident,  as  the  divers  lusts 
which  mankind  serve. 

Yet  it  is  most  assuredly  a  very  fallacious  mode  of  reasoning 
which  would  lead  us  to  look  on  mankind  as  not  depraved,  merely 
because  they  are  not  addicted  to  every  possible  sin.  We  suspect, 
however,  that  there  are  persons  who  have  no  other  ground  for  re- 
garding themselves  as  morally  right  except  the  absence  of  certain 
vices.  Thus  the  miser  congratulates  himself  on  his  not  having 
run  in  debt  by  extravagance,  while  the  thoughtless  spendthrift  re- 
joices that  he  is  not  so  narrow-minded  and  contracted  in  his  feel- 
ings and  disposition  as  the  miser.  The  drunkard  boasts  that  he 
is  not  dishonest,  and  the  cunning  deceitful  man  tells  you,  with  an 
air  of  triumph,  that  he  is  not  intemperate.  The  man  of  dull  tem- 
perament, whose  soul  resembles  a  day  of  mists,  without  torrents 
of  rain,  indeed,  but  perpetually  cold— not  absolutely  dark,  indeed, 
but  disclosing  none  of  the  distant  landscapes  on  which  the  eye  of 
faith  delights  to  repose — never  brightened  by  the  sunshine  of  hope, 
or  warmed  by  the  ardor  of  fervent  charity  ; — such  an  one  assumes 
superiority,  because  he  keeps  free  from  violent  excitement,  and  ex- 
tricates himself  from  difficulties  into  which  others,  by  their  impet- 
uosity, contrive  to  plunge.  Thus  every  man  would  infer,  from  the 
absence  of  some  one  sin,  the  presence  of  a  positive  virtue.  But 
the  conclusion  is  evidently  an  unsound  one.  The  poet  Milton 
paints  the  fallen  angels  as  each  possessing  a  distinctive  character 
— one  swayed  by  a  love  of  gold,  another  by  a  love  of  splendor, 
and  a  third  by  a  lust  of  dominion,  one  being  disposed  to  accomplish 
his  designs  by  fraud,  and  another  by  force  •  yet  this  difference  of 
characteristic  has  never  been  reckoned  as  excusing  the  rebellion 
of  any,  and  just  as  little  can  the  diversity  of  man's  charaeter.be 


AND   GODLINESS    &&   MAN5S   CHARACTER.  371 

held  as  excusing  the  sin  of  any  given  individual.^  That  soil 
would  be  described  as  polluted  which  produced  only  weeds,  and 
ihis  though  it  did  not  produce  every  kind  of  weed,  though  the  soil 
at  the  tropics  did  not  yield  the  same  species  as  the  soil  in  the  arc- 
tic regions.  We  hold  that  every  man's  nature  is  really  sinful, 
even  when  it  can  be  shown  that  the  man  of  cold  temperament  is 
not  guilty  of  every  sin  into  which  the  man  of  more  fervent  spirit 
is  apt  to  fall. 

In  speaking  of  man's  wickedness,  it  is  to  be  taken  into  account,; 
as  a  third  limitation^  that  man  is  not  sv  corrupt  that  he  can- 
not become  worse.  Mankind  are  not  commonly  so  depraved  in 
their  younger  years  as  in  after-life,  when  their  vicious  propensities 
have  had  time  to  expand.  Man's  natural  depravity  is  more  like 
the  seed  than  the  tree — it  may  be  compared  to  the  fountain  rather 
than  the  stream. 

But  let  no  man  congratulate  himself  upon  the  circumstance, 
that  he  is  not  so  wicked  as  he  might  possibly  be.  Man's  liability 
to  fall  farther — his  capacity  for  wickedness — is  one  of  the  most 
fearful  of  his  characteristics.  The  depravity  so  deeply  woven  into 
human  nature  often  lurks  within  when  it  does  not  exhibit  itself 
without.  The  fire  may  not  have  broken  forth,  but  there  exists 
the  spark,  which  needs  only  to  be  fanned  by  the  winds  of  tempta- 
tion to  break  forth  into  a  flame.  Every  man  has  not  felt  the  more 
sinful  passions  in  their  greatest  height  and  intensity  of  power,  but 
he  may  at  least  have  experienced  them  in  their  commencing 
movements.  No  one  has  mingled  much  with  mankind  without 
being  thrown  into  positions,  sometimes  for  a  longer,  and  sometimes 
for  a  shorter  space,  in  which  his  utmost  exertions  were  required 
to  keep  his  spirit  from  running  wild  into  disorder  or  violence*  On 
one  occasion  it  may  have  been  a  momentary  wish  to  thwart  a  ri- 
val in  business  or  in  fame,  who  has  wounded  our  vanity  or  dark- 
ened our  prospects  of  success.  On  some  other  occasion  we  may; 
have  felt  disposed  to  wreak  a  petty  revenge  for  an  offence,  real  or 
imaginary.  On  a  third  occasion  we  may  have  longed  to  obtain 
some  forbidden  pleasure,  of  which  we  could  taste  without  the  risk 
of  detection.  All  of  us  must  have  felt  these  passions,  or  others 
similar  to  them,  and  equally  dangerous,  stirring  within  our  bosom  ; 
and  on  such  occasions,  when  the  soul  is  tempest-tossed  and  moved, 
we  are  permitted  to  discover  depths  which  might  otherwise  have 
remained  concealed  in  their  own  silent  darkness.  Such  feelings 
would  never  spring  up  in  a  breast  perfectly  holy ;  they  are  indica- 


372  THEORY   OF   THE    PRODUCTION   OF 

lions  of  a  deeply-seated  depravity.  They  are  the  commencing  of 
elementary  states  of  those  passions  which  carry  men  such  far 
lengths  in  wickedness.  They  are  like  the  heavy  drops  which 
sometimes  come  before  the  shower,  the  strong  gusts  which  precede 
the  full  fury  of  the  coming  tempest.  They  are  the  first  heavings 
of  an  ocean,  which  may  soon  be  tossed  up  by  the  continuance  of 
the  same  power  to  its  lowest  profundities.  Only  allow  them  to 
increase — only  encourage  them  by  indulgence — only  add  fuel  to 
the  fire — and  they  will  soon  break"  forth  with  unappeasable  fury, 
while  the  astonished  reason  is  obliged  to  stand  by  in  utter  impo- 
tence. 

It  is  a  most  alarming  consideration  that  man's  character  is  sel- 
dom stationary  ;  it  is  like  the  vessel  on  the  wide  ocean  with  wind 
and  tide  against  it ;  and  if  he  is  not  struggling  against  the  pas- 
sions, they  will  hurry  him  into  yet  greater  extremes  of  wicked- 
ness. What  melancholy  proofs  do  we  see  in  the  world  around 
us  !  You  wonder  at  the  drunkard  become  so  infatuated  ;  but  the 
grieving,  the  downcast  mother,  or  the  disheartened  wife,  can  tell 
you  of  a  time — and  a  sigh  heaves  her  bosom  as  she  speaks  of  it — 
when  the  now  outcast  and  degraded  one  was  loved  and  respected, 
and  returned  with  regularity  to  quiet  and  domestic  peace  in  the 
bosom  of  the  family.  But,  alas  !  he  would  not  believe  the  warn- 
ings of  a  parent,  he  did  not  attend  to  the  meek  unobtrusive  recom- 
mendations of  a  wife  or  sister ;  he  despised  the  commands  of  the 
living  God,  and  he  sought  for  happiness  where  it  has  never  been 
found ;  and  he  spurned  at  those  who  told  him  that  the  habit  was 
fixing  its  roots,  till  now  he  has  become  the  scorn  and  jest  of  the 
thoughtless,  and  the  object  of  pity  to  the  wise  and  good  ,'  boasting 
to  his  companions,  in  the  midst  of  his  brutal  mirth,  of  his  strength 
of  mind,  and  yet  unable  to  resist  the  least  temptation  ;  and  talking 
of  his  kindness  of  heart,  while  his  friends  and  family  are  pining 
in  poverty,  or  weeping  over  his  waywardness.  It  is  one  of  many 
indications  that  might  be  adduced  of  the  tendency  of  sin  to  pro- 
pagate itself,  and  spread  throughout  the  soul  in  ever-widening 
circles. 

SECTION.    V.— THEORY    OF    THE    PRODUCTION    OF    THE    EXISTING 
MORAL    STATE    OF    MAN. 

We  have  been  viewing  some  of  the  characteristics  of  man's 
nature,  and  the  following  explanation  seems  as  if  it  might  account 
historically  for  the  leading  phenomena. 


THE    EXISTING    MORAL    STATE    OF    MAN.  373 

"Suppose  that  there  is  a  being  constituted  in  all  other  respects  as 
man  is,  with  his  high  faculties,  his  lovely  affections,  and  amiable 
feelings  ;  in  whom  the  law  in  the  heart  is  wont  to  exercise  its  be- 
coming office,  and  whose  heart  is  filled  with  love  to  the  Creator 
and  the  creature.  But  this  being,  yielding  to  tempting  suggestions 
made  to  him,  is  led  to  commit  a  deed  that  is  positively  sinful.  The 
act  must  speedily  pass  under  the  review  of  the  conscience,  and  the 
conscience  pronounces  an  instant  condemnation.  And  what  is 
now  to  be  done  under  this  sense  of  sin  ?  Let  the  person,  some 
one  will  answer,  cherish  repentance,  and  seek  forgiveness  from 
God.  Now,  repentance  is  undoubtedly  the  duty,  and  the  instant 
duty,  of  the  individual  who  is  so  situated.  But  then,  this  repent- 
ance cannot  make  any  atonement  for  the  previous  neglect  of  duty. 
Conscience  undoubtedly  approves  of  the  repentance  as  required  in 
the  circumstances,  but  it  is  beyond  the  province  of  the  conscience 
to  say  that  repentance  can  make  any  amends  for  the  evil  done; 
nay,  the  conscience  continues  to  condemn  the  deed  even  after  re- 
pentance, and  the  mind  is  led  to  anticipate  a  punishment  to  follow. 
Even  on  the  supposition  that  repentance  followed,  and  that  there 
was  never  another  sin  committed,  still  the  mind  would  look  back 
to  the  transgression  as  a  fearfully  dark  event  suggesting  awful 
forebodings. 

But  it  is  just  as  conceivable  that  the  person's  conduct  may  be  dif- 
ferent. It  may  be  doubted  whether  genuine  repentance  in  the  cir- 
cumstances is  within  the  native  power  of  the  human  mind.  A 
moral  and  responsible  being  wandering  from  the  path  of  rectitude, 
cannot  return  to  it  any  more  than  a  planet  wandering  from  its 
course  could  come  back  to  its  path.  It  seems,  at  least,  to  be  as 
probable  that  the  individual  referred  to  refuses  to  repent,  or  rather 
puts  aside  repentance.  His  mind  will  now  be  in  a  singularly  per- 
plexed and  painful  state.  Following  the  natural  train  of  mental 
association,  according  to  which  everything  that  excites  the  mind 
returns  repeatedly  before  it,  the  transgression  will  often  present 
itself;  and  as  often  as  the  memory  recalls  it,  the  conscience  will 
condemn  the  deed,  and  hurry  the  mind  onward  to  impending  judg- 
ments. These  recollections  and  anticipations  will  be  accompanied 
by  a  train  of  troubled  thoughts  and  feelings,  crowding  on  one  an- 
other like  the  waves  of  an  ocean  agitated  by  opposing  winds  and 
•currents. 

A  condemnation  of  sin  and  a  horror  of  it,  these  are  feelings 
may  be  called  up  even  in  the  minds  of  beings  perfectly  holy. 


374  THEORY    OP   THE    PRODUCTION   OF 

The  contemplation  of  sin  by  persons  possessed  of  a  moral  sens® 
must  always  be  painful ;  and  possibly  the  only  feeling  of  pair* 
which  holy  beings  experience  is  that  which  arises  from  the  thought 
of  sin.  But  in  their  minds  the  thought  is  but  a  passing  one,  and 
is  speedily  swallowed  up  in  other  and  delightful  sentiments.  Butr 
if  even  the  very  thought  of  sin,  or  sight  of  it,  be  painful  to  a  mind 
regulated  by  the  law  of  rectitude,  how  much  more  painful  must  it 
be,  to  a  being  newly  fallen,  to  brood  on  the  sin  committed  by  him- 
self, and  how  fearfully  painful  to"  brood  on  that  sin  constantly  t 
Actseon  like,  he  has  looked  on  that  which  is  forbidden,  and  his 
mind  has  changed  its  very  nature,  and  assumed  a  wolf-like  form, 
and  reproaches  like  hounds  pursue  the  soul  that  begat,  them. 

But  is  there  no  way  by  which  the  recollections  of  the  sin  may 
be  banished  from  the  mind  ?  As  there  are  laws  of  association 
which  recall  the  sinful  deed,  there  are  other  principles  in  the  mind 
which  prompt  it  to  turn  away  from  the  thought  and  contempla- 
tion of  that  which  brings  only  pain.  A  contest  has  now  begun  in 
a  mind  which  was  before  at  rest,  and  to  all  appearance  it  is  aeon- 
test,  which,  if  there  be  no  interposition  on  the  part  of  God,  must 
rage  for  ever.  There  are  laws  of  association  good  in  themselves, 
which  will  tend  to  recall  the  deed  just  because  it  has  excited  the 
mind ;  and  the  deed  recalled  calls  forth  a  condemnation  by  the 
conscience,  followed  by  painful  emotions ;  and  speedily  as  they 
rise,  there  will  be  an  attempt  to  drive  them  away  just  because  they 
are  painful.  The  aversion  to  the  contemplation  of  an  unpleasant 
topic  will  lead  the  individual  to  mingle  in  such  scenes,  that  the 
objects  presented  to  the  eye  may  carry  away  the  mind  to  other 
subjects  ;  or  he  will  endeavor  so  to  change  the  train  of  association, 
that  more  pleasing  thoughts  may  rise  up  before  the  mind.  The 
attempts  made  to  expel  the  evil  serve  only  to  exasperate  it.  The 
studious  endeavors,  to  bury  the  sin  in  oblivion  will  just  turn  it  up 
the  more  frequently  to  have  a  new  and  farther  sentence  pronounced 
upon  it  by  the  conscience,  and  the  sentence  will  be  followed  up  by 
those  avenging  feelings  which  wait  upon  the  conscience  as  the 
officers  of  its  court  of  justice. 

The  struggle  is  now  thickened,  and  other  parties  are  involved 
iii  its  fearful  and  all-absorbing  eddies  and  whirlpools.  When  the 
governing  power  of  the  soul  has  lost  its  authority,  the  appetites 
and  affections  of  the  mind  will  follow  each  its  own  impulse;  and 
all  becomes  unsettled  and  disordered,  as  in  a  country  where  there- 
is  no  government,  and  every  man  does  that  which  is  right  in  bis 


THE    EXISTING    MORAL    STATE    OF   MAN.  375 

own  eyes,— where  might  and  activity,  where  courage  and  audacity, 
overbear  right  and  justice.  Every  lust  and  appetite  seeks  its 
gratification,  and  acknowledges  no  authority  to  control  it.  The 
love  of  happiness,  good  in  itself  when  properly  guided,  now  becomes 
a  blind  chase  after  pleasure  of  every  kind.  The  sensibility,  now, 
is  dried  up  when  it  ought  to  run,  and  forthwith  comes  in  "  like  a 
wide  rushing  in  of  waters,"  when  it  should  be  restrained.  The 
benevolent  affections  refuse  to  embrace  certain  objects  to  which 
they  ought  to  be  directed,  and  flow  out  towards  others  in  the  streams 
of  a  doating  and  capricious  love.  The  intellectual  faculties  before 
employed  in  seeking  after  truth  and  in  devising  good,  are  now  em- 
ployed in  contriving  means  of  banishing  the  recollection  of  sin, 
and  gratifying  the  now  unrestrained  feelings.  And  there  is  another 
element  .which  now  comes  into  play.  Since  sin  has  been  com- 
mitted, and  condemnation  pronounced,  it  is  thought  that  a  few 
more  sins  may  not  much  aggravate  the  guilt,  or  place  the  sinner 
in  a  much  worse  condition,  and  sins  come  to  be  knowingly  and 
wilfully  committed.  The  malignant  passions  now  come  out  as 
beasts  of  prey  do  in  the  night,  and  the  filthy  lusts  creep  out  as 
insects  crawl  forth  in  the  damp  and  moisture. 

Such,  we  might  predict,  according  to  the  principles  of  the  human 
mind,  would  be  the  general  issue  to  which  the  commission  of  sin 
would  conduct  a  being  so  situated.  The  particular  results  can- 
not be  anticipated  or  delineated  by  human  sagacit}^  We  could 
confidently  predict,  that  certain  evil  effects  must  follow,  if  a  steam- 
locomotive  were  to  pass  off  the  rails,  or  a  stream  to  burst  its  banks, 
or  the  ocean  to  break  down  the  barriers  against  which  it  beats, 
though  we  might  not  be  able  to  tell  the  particular  direction  or 
channel,  which  the  rebellious  agent  might  take.  We  can,  in  like 
manner,  foresee  certain  evils  that  would  follow  from  the  commission 
of  sin  tin  the  part  of  a  moral  agent,  though  we  may  not  be  able  to 
define  the  precise  turn  which  these  evils  would  take;  nay,  this 
turn  would  evidently  depend  on  the  peculiar  character  of  the  indi- 
vidual, on  the  circumstances  in  which  he  happened  to  be  placed, 
and  the  nature  of  the  sin  which  he  first  committed. 

A  stream  bursting  from  its  course,  will  for  a  lime  spread  itself 
tumultuously  in  all  directions,  carrying  devastation  wherever  it 
goes  ;  but  it  will  at  last  form  a  new  channel  for  itself.  After  the 
same  manner,  the  fallen  being  that  we  are  contemplating,  after 
turning  hither  and  thither  for  a  time,  would  soon  acquire  certain 
confirmed  ways  and  habits,  partly  determined  by  his  situation, 


376  THEORY    OF    THE    PRODUCTION    OF 

and  partly  by  the  peculiarities  of  his  native  dispositions.  If  he  is 
near  to  God,  it  is  conceivable  that  he  may  speedily  be  exasperated 
into  open  rebellion  ;  and  if  driven  to  a  distance  from  God,  he  may 
rather  seek  to  abandon  himself  to  sulkiness  and  forgetfulness  of 
God,  and  all  that  is  good.  If  consigned  immediately  to  punish- 
ment, there  will  result  a  confirmed  obstinacy  and  hatred  of  God  ; 
and  provided  a  period  of  respite  and  comparative  freedom  be 
allowed,  there  will  rather  be  a  swelling  pride,  and  an  active  and 
aspiring  ambition,  prompting  to  new  and  bold  and  daring  enter- 
prises. The  employments  and  habits  of  the  parties  would  also  be 
determined  by  their  native  propensities,  now  abused  and  perverted, 
and  flowing  out,  each  in  its  own  channel,  all  unrestrained  by 
higher  principle.  Our  Epic  poet  seems  to  be  as  philosophically 
correct  as  he  is  poetically  picturesque,  in  the  view  which  he  gives 
of  the  fallen  angels,  when  he  represents  them  as  differing  from 
each  other  in  their  characters,  and  each  under  his  own  predomin- 
ating lust  and  passion. 

It  must  be  left  to  every  man's  consciousness  to  determine  how 
far  the  delineation  now  given  bears  any  general  resemblance  to 
his  own  felt  experience.  We  say,  general  resemblance ;  for  it  will 
at  once  occur  to  every  one  that  there  is  a  difference,  and  that  not 
of  an  unimportant  kind,  between  the  hypothetical  and  real  case ; 
and  we  now  refer  to  this  difference  as  sufficient  to  explain  the  dis- 
crepancy between  the  picture  which  has  been  drawn  and  the 
actual  state  of  man.  In  the  supposed  case,  the  individual  remem- 
bers a  time  when  he  was  without  sin  ;  whereas  the  memory  of 
man  cannot  go  back  to  a  time  when  he  was  not  transgressing  the 
commandments  of  God.  This  difference  in  the  cause  must  pro- 
duce a  difference  in  the  effect,  and  that  of  an  influential  character. 
The  conscience  of  sin  cannot  be  so  acute  when  the  mind  never 
knew  what  it  was  to  be  unspotted,  as  it  must  necessarily  be  when 
it  can  look  back  on  a  time  when  it  was  untainted  by  sin  in  thought 
or  feeling.  Hence  the  deadness  of  the  conscience,  on  the  part  of 
mankind  in  general,  so  different  from  the  keen  sensibility  of  those 
angelic  beings  who  have  fallen  from  purity.  We  may  now  dis- 
cover one  reason  why  man  in  his  present  state  is  prevented  from 
reaching  that  demoniacal  madness  and  fury  which  agitate  all 
those  who  have  an  acute  sense  of  the  sin  in  which  they  still 
indulge.  Whether,  after  the  day  of  judgment,  man  may  not  be 
driven  to  the  same  extreme,  is  a  question  which  will  fall  to  be 
considered  in  a  future  section.  We  refer  to  this  difference  between 


THE    EXISTING    MORAL    STATE    OP    MAN.  377 

fallen  angels  and  fallen  men,  in  order  to  explain  how  the  latter 
may  live  in  a  state  of  insensibility  in  regard  to  their  sin.  This 
same  circumstance,  as  accounting  for  the  deadness  of  the  human 
conscience,  also  explains  the  confirmed  nature  of  the  sinful  affec- 
tions which  mankind  cherish,  and  the  courses  of  conduct  pursued 
by  them.  Springing  up  with  them  from  their  youth,  their  sinful 
affections  and  habits  are  entwined  with  every  part  of  their  nature, 
and  have  become,  as  it  were,  essential  parts  of  themselves.  These 
two  tendencies,  originating  in  the  circumstance  that  sin  is  natural 
to  mankind,  act  and  react  upon,  and  strengthen  each  other.  Sin 
is  scarcely  noticed,  because  it  has  all  along  been  committed  ;  and 
because  it  is  not  observed,  it  continues  to  grow  and  strengthen 
without  check  and  restraint.  This  twofold  action  must  continue 
till  such  time  as  the  whole  position  of  the  man  is  changed  by 
events  in  this  world  or  the  next,  bringing  his  guilt  before  his  mind 
in  all  its  hideousness  and  enormity,  and  setting  him  upon  a  new 
and  different  career,  more  nearly  allied  to  that  of  the  fallen  angelic 
host. 

But  taking  this  most  important  difference  into  account,  it  is 
worthy  of  being  inquired,  whether  the  hypothetical  case  does  not 
in  some  measure  enable  us  to  understand  the  mystery  of  man's 
nature  and  character.  In  particular,  there  are  two  classes  of 
phenomena,  which  we  are  enabled  to  explain,  and  these  among 
the  most  curious  in  the  human  mind. 

First,  we  see  how,  on  such  an  hypothesis,  there  is  room  for  the 
exercise  of  all  the  faculties  of  man's  nature,  and  also  for  an  exhi- 
bition of  the  individual  character  of  individual  men,  and  for  a 
variety  of  character  on  the  part  of  mankind  generally.  In  the 
fall  of  man,  much  the  same  effects  have  followed,  as  we  read  of 
being  produced  by  earthquakes,  which  have  turned  rectilineal 
alleys  into  crooked  ones,  changing  the  courses  of  rivers,  and 
thrown  one  man's  property  upon  another,  or  have  been  produced 
in  those  metamorphic  geological  rocks,  which  have  changed  in  their 
structure  without  changing  their  elements.  There  has  been  such 
a  twisting  of  the  human  character  in  the  fall,  and  yet  the  consti- 
tution of  man's  nature  has  not  been  annihilated.  Its  faculties  do 
not  work  as  before ;  but  still  they  work,  though  in  a  new  way, 
as  we  see  all  the  vital  functions  of  those  who  have  become  de- 
formed from  the  womb,  playing  in  them,  as  in  persons  of  full  form 
and  stature.  The  man  of  high  ability,  will  be  a  man  of  high 
ability  still ;  the  man  of  deep  sensibility,  will  still  have  a  fountain 


STATE    OP    THE    CONSCIENCE    IN 

of  emotion  ready  to  flow  out.  There  may  still  be  shrewd  obser- 
vation, lofty  speculation,  consecutive  argument,  fine  fancy,  and 
bold  imagination,  tender  sensibility,  and  elevated  sentiment.  With- 
out any  godliness,  and  with  a  mind  utterly  perverted,  there  may 
be  ingenuity  like  that  of  Hume — acuteness,  like  that  of  Voltaire— 
a  noble  independence  of  sentiment,  like  that  of  Burns — a  sensibi- 
lity as  tender  as  that  of  Rousseau — a  reach  of  fancy,  like  that  of 
Shelley— or  a  power  of  anatomizing  the  human  heart,  as  profound 
as  that  of  Byron. 

Secondly,  we  see  how  there  may  be  many  amiable  and  even 
noble  and  generous  qualities  in  man's  fallen  nature.  Just  as  the 
disordered  machine  may  perform  many  graceful  evolutions,  show- 
ing what  it  could  do  if  properly  regulated  ;  and  just  as  the  maniac 
may  sometimes  reason  correctly,  or  even  exhibit  brilliant  intel- 
lectual feats  ;  so  a  disordered  moral  nature  is  not  incompatible 
with  the  exercise  of  a  hundred  pleasing  accomplishments,  and  the 
working  of  not  a  few  disinterested  and  benevolent  affections. 

The  theory  now  developed,  also  serves  to  explain  a  third  very 
important  class  of  phenomena,  which  we  would  now  proceed  to 
consider,  being*  the  workings  of  conscience  in  the  soul  of  fallen 
man. 

SECTION  VI.— STATE  OF  THE  CONSCIENCE  IN  THE  DEPRAVED 

NATURE. 

It  is  very  difficult  to  determine,  in  a  precise  and  philosophical 
manner,  wherein  the  conscience  in  man's  existing  moral  nature 
differs,  in  respect  of  place  and  authority,  from  the  conscience  in 
those  beings  in  whom  it  subordinates  every  other  faculty  and 
feeling.  There  is  little  difficulty,  indeed,  in  proving  that  man's 
moral  nature  is  in  a  state  of  derangement,  and  that  the  moral 
faculty  has  not  the  power  which  it  ought  to  possess.  It  is  as  easy 
to  demonstrate  that  there  is  disorder  in  man's  moral  state  as  to  show 
that  there  is  derangement  in  the  intellect  of  the  lunatic.  In  some 
cases  we  could  bring  proof  of  the  madman's  insanity  sufficient  to 
convince  for  the  time  the  intellect  of  the  madman  himself.  We 
can  in  every  case  make  the  conscience  decide  that  man's  moral 
nature  is  disorganized.  We  can  constrain  every  man  to  condemn 
himself,  just  as  the  people  of  England  made  the  most  infamous 
of  their  judges  (Jeffreys)  sign  a  warrant  for  his  own  apprehension. 
But  it  becomes  a  much  more  difficult  task  to  show  wherein  this 
disorder  precisely  consists,  as  difficult  as  to  determine  wherein  in- 


THE    DEPRAVED    NATURE.  379 

tellectual  derangement  lies — a  question  which  has  hitherto  baffled 
the  most  acute  philosophers  and  sagacious  observers. 

It  is  a  common  way  of  accounting  for  the  anomalies  in  man's 
moral  state  to  say,  in  a  loose  and  general  way,  that  the  conscience 
has  lost  its  control  over  the  other  faculties  of  the  human  mind. 
Now,  it  is  quite  true  that  the  conscience  has  lost  its  proper  control, 
but  it  has  not  lost  all  power.  On  the  contrary,  it  is  in  some  re- 
spects as  active  and  energetic  as  ever.  It  works  not  the  less  po- 
tently because  it  works  destructively.  A  court  of  justice  perverted 
into  a  court  of  injustice  may  be  as  active  in  its  latter  as  in  its  former 
capacity.  The  Court  of  Inquisition  in  Spain,  the  Star  Chamber 
and  the  Court  of  High  Commission  in  the  reign  of  the  Stuarts  in 
our  own  country,  and  the  tribunals  in  Paris  in  the  Reign  of  Terror, 
were  as  busily  employed,  and  as  powerful,  as  the  most  righteous 
courts  of  justice  that  ever  sate  in  the  same  kingdoms.  It  is  not 
conceivable  that  the  conscience  should  ever  cease  to  exist  in  the 
breast  of  any  responsible  agent ;  certain  it  is,  that  in  man's  pres- 
ent nature  it  often  wields  a  tremendous  energy.  Misery  never 
reaches  its  utmost  intensity  except  when  inflicted  by  the  scourges 
of  an  accusing  conscience.  Wickedness  never  becomes  so  unre- 
lenting as  when  it  seems  to  have  received  the  sanction  of  the 
moral  law;  What  might  otherwise  have  been  a  mere  impulse  of 
blind  passion  becomes  now  persevering  and  systematic  villany  or 
cruelty.  Not  unfrequently  it  assumes  the  shape  of  cool-blooded 
persecution,  committed  without  reluctance  and  without  remorse. 
The  conscience  now  shows  what  had  been  its  power  for  good  if 
properly  exercised,  and  how  it  can  bear  down  and  subordinate  all 
the  other  and  mere  sympathetic  feelings  of  the  mind. 

The  cruelty  inflicted  in  times  of  political  convulsion  furnishes  a 
too  apposite  illustration.  This  cruelty  becomes  so  great  just  be- 
cause it  has  taken  the  name  of  justice,  and  seems  to  be  the 
avenger  of  the  trampled  rights  of  men,  whether  princes  or  people. 
Besides  feelings  of  personal  revenge,  there  has  been  an  idea  of 
supporting  the  rights  of  sovereigns,  and  the  cause  of  good  govern-' 
ment,  in  those  dreadful  injuries  which  tyrants  have  inflicted  on 
their  subjects  who,  in  fact  or  appearance,  were  disposed  to  rebel- 
lion. It  was  because  they  were  esteemed  as  the  enemies  of  the 
liberties  of  the  people  that  so  many  were  hurried  to  the  prison  and 
the  guillotine  during  the  frenzy  of  the  French  Revolution  ;  and  it 
is  certain  that  some  of  the  most  prominent  actors  in  the  most 
atrocious  scenes,  such  as  Robespierre,  were  not  naturally  cruel. 


380  STATE    OF    THE    CONSCIENCE    IN 

Oppression,  whether  exercised  by  the  many  or  the  few,  has  never 
been  intensely  severe  till  it  has  assumed  the  name,  and  professes 
to  assert  and  avenge  the  rights  of  justice  ;  and  it  now  becomes  so 
unrelenting,  just  because  it  does  everything  in  the  name  of  law 
and  conscience.  We  have  heard  of  the  bitterness  of  legalized 
tyranny,  that  is,  of  tyranny  legalized  by  civil  law  ;  but  this  is 
nothing  to  the  severity  which  regards  itself  as  consecrated  by 
moral  law. 

The  persecution  becomes  tenfold  more  bitter  and  unrelenting, 
when  instead  of  the  name  of  justice,  it  can  take  to  itself  the  still 
more  sacred  name  of  religion  ;  and  the  actors  imagine  that  they 
are  promoting  higher  interests  than  those  of  man,  and  doing  ser- 
vice to  God.  "  The  apotheosis  of  error/''  says  Bacon,  "  is  the 
greatest  evil  of  all."*  Take  the  following  illustration  of  the  two 
species  of  cruelty. 

In  one  of  the  instructive  incidents  of  the  French  Revolution, 
we  have  the  record  of  a  lady  of  rank  (mother  of  the  Marquis  de 
Custine)  assaulted  by  an  infernal  mob,  as  she  was  descending  the 
stairs  of  the  building  in  which  her  father-in-law  was  being  tried. 
"  It  is  the  daughter  of  the  traitor,"  (observe  how  men  must  first 
defame  those  whom  they  injure,)  was  the  language  which,  mingled 
with  horrid  imprecations,  reached  her  ears.  Already  some  with 
naked  swords  had  placed  themselves  before  her ;  others,  half- 
clothed,  had  caused  their  women  to  draw  back,  a  certain  sign  that 
murder  was  about  to  be  enacted ;  and  she  felt  that  the  first  symp- 
tom of  weakness  betrayed  by  her  would  be  the  symptom  of  her 
death.  At  this  crisis,  she  observed  a  fisher-woman  among  the 
foremost  of  the  crowd.  The  woman,  who  was  revolting  in  ap- 
pearance, held  an  infant  in  her  arms.  The  lady  approached  her, 
and  said,  "  what  a  sweet  babe  you  have  !"  Take  it,  replied  the 
parent,  who  understood  her  by  one  word  and  glance,  you  can  re- 
turn it  to  me  at  the  foot  of  the  steps.  With  the  child  in  her  arms, 
the  lady  descended  into  the  court,  unsaluted  by  even  an  abusive 
word.t  It  is  a  picture  of  the  scenes  of  a  political  convulsion  ;  and 
we  discover  in  it  the  working  of  an  unenlightened  conscience,  and 
a  perverted  sense  of  wrong,  making  the  actors  to  clothe  their  vic- 
tims in  imaginary  guilt,  before  treating  them  as  guilty.  Mingled 
with  this  perverted  moral  feeling,  we  discover  sympathetic  feel- 
ings, more  particularly  in  the  female  bosom  ;  and  we  observe 
.these  feelings  gaining  over  the  very  conscience  at  first  perverted 
*  Novuin  Organum  f  Int.  of  Custines,  Emp.  of  Czar. 


THE    DEPRAVED    NATURE,  381 

and  leading  the  most  brutal  to  a*t  aright,  when  their  feelings  of 
compassion  are  in  the  right  direction. 

The  massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew  exhibits  a  still  darker  scene, 
and  one  as  characteristic  of  a  religious  (so  called)  as  the  other  is 
of  a  political  convulsion.  A  ruthless  murderer  lays  hold  of  an 
infant,  and  while  holding  it,  the  babe  smiles  in  his  face,  and  be- 
gins to  play  with  his  beard ;  but  it  is  to  no  purpose,  for  the  dag- 
ger is  instantly  plunged  into  the  child's  breast,  and  the  body  is  cast 
into  the  river,  amidst  the  jeers  of  an  infuriated  populace,  who  are 
crying  out,  "Where  is  now  your  God?  What  is  become  of  all 
your  psalms  and  prayers  now  ?"  The  scene  that  follows  is  not 
less  characteristic.  A  crowd  of  persons  has  assembled  before  the 
gates  of  the  church  at  Lyons,  and  they  are  waiting  on  their  knees 
the  return  of  an  ecclesiastical  dignitary,  who  had  been  paying  his 
devotions  in  the  interior  of  the  building.  They  are  the  very  per- 
sons who  had  been  perpetrating  wholesale  murders,  or  inciting  the 
murderers  ;  and  now  they  are  waiting  the  absolution  and  blessing 
of  the  cardinal.  As  he  approaches,  they  bend  their  heads  in  low- 
liest adoration  ;  and  he  lifts  up  his  hands  and  grants  them  for- 
giveness, and  the  blessing  of  heaven.  The  cries  of  the  murdered 
are  forgotten  by  the  mob  as  they  retire ;  their  minds  inhaling  the 
incense  of  an  apparently  approving  conscience,  which  seems  to 
point  to  an  approving  God. 

Such  facts  as  these  show  that  whatever  may  be  the  fault  of  the 
conscience,  it  has  not  lost  its  power.  While  man's  moral  nature 
is  completely  disorganized,  it  has  lost  none  of  its  essential  ele- 
ments. 

The  moral  disorder  of  the  mind  begins  with  the  will  setting  at 
nought  the  decisions  of  the  conscience.  In  running  the  course  of 
duty  allotted  to  it,  the  will  has  allowed  itself  to  stoop  down,  like 
Atalanta,  and  pick  up  the  golden  apples  spread  in  its  way.  The 
conscience  forthwith  condemns  the  will  for  so  acting.  The  will 
now  sets  about  contriving  a  means  of  escape  from  the  humbling 
reproaches  heaped  on  the  mind  by  the  conscience.  The  moral 
disorder  has  now  begun. 

The  conditions  of  responsibility  seem  to  be  conscience,  will,  and 
intelligence : — the  conscience  being  the  law,  the  will  the  agent, 
and  the  intelligence  the  means  of  announcing  the  state  of  the 
case  to  the  law.  The  will,  as  the  agent,  is  the  immediate  seat  of 
good  or  evil.  Hence  all  evil  must  be  seated  primarily  in  it.  But 
the  will,  if  depraved,  will  soon  come  to  sway  the  intelligence,  and 


STATE    OF   THE    CONSCIENCE    IN 

the  intelligence  gives  a  false  flf>ort  to  the  conscience,  which  ut» 
ters  in  consequence  a  false  judgment.  If  this  view  is  correct,  then 
we  see  that  the  moral  disorder,  beginning  in  the  will,  lies  all  along 
essentially  in  the  will — which  corrupts  the  intelligence,  which 
again  deceives  the  conscience.  As  long  as  the  will  is  corrupt,  the 
intelligence  will  be  perverted,  and  the  conscience  deluded.  Give 
us  but  a  corrected  will,  and  the  intelligence  will  give  in  faithful  re* 
ports,  and  the  conscience  will  become  an  unerring  guide*  f'  And 
here  we  may  take  occasion  to  observe  the  misery  of  man's  cor- 
rupted nature,  wherein  those  faculties,  which  were  originally  or- 
dained for  mutual  assistance,  do  now  exercise  a  mutual  impos- 
ture ;  and  as  man  did  join  with  a  fellow- creature  to  dishonor,  and 
if  it  had  been  possible,  to  deceive  his  Maker ;  so  in  the  faculties 
of  man,  we  may  discover  a  joint  conspiracy  in  the  working  of  their 
own  overthrow  and  reproach,  and  a  secret  joy  in  one  to  be  deceived 
by  another."* 

But  let.it  be  observed,  that  while  we  allow  that  the  mind  is 
thoroughly  perverted,  we  yet  retain  in  the  midst  of  it  a  place  for 
the  conscience.  We  have  all  along  been  protesting  against  the 
idea,  that  moral  excellence  consists  in  the  possession,  or  in  the 
working  of  the  conscience.  Moral  good  consists,  not: in  the  exer- 
cise of  the  conscience,  but  in  an  obedience  rendered  to  the  con* 
science.  If  the  conscience  is  present  in  the  bosoms  of  the  good, 
it  is  no  less  present  in  the  bosoms  of  the  wicked.  Where  there 
is  no  law,  there  is  no  transgression.  Take  away  the  conscience 
or  the  law  in  the  heart,  and  the  agent  becomes  henceforth  not 
only  incapable  of  good,  but  also  incapable  of  evil. 

There  are  two  ways  by  which  the  mind,  in  its  voluntary  action, 
contrives  to  deceive  the  conscience. 

First,  It  contrives  to  banish  as  much  as  possible  the  remem- 
brance of  the  sinful  acts  committed.  When  men  go  to  sleep, 
they  darken  their  windows;  and  when  the  guilty  wish  to  be  un- 
disturbed, they  shut  out  all  thought  and  consideration  of  the  evil 
they  have  done.  'The  polluting  lusts  that  were  fondled,  so  long 
as  they  could  communicate  pleasure,  are  now  banished  out  of 
sight  when  they  have  served  their  purpose  ;  as  the  embalmers  in 
ancient  Egypt,  sent  for,  in  the  first  instance,  with  avidity,  had  to 
flee  as  fast  as  they  could  after  their  offensive  work  was  completed. 
The  malignant  passions,  after  being  gratified,  must  keep  out  of 

*  Bishop  Reynolds  on  the  Affections. 


THE    DEPRAVED   NATURE,  383 

sight,  as  hired  assassins  are  got  rid  of  after  they  have  done  the 
deed. 

Secondly,  The  mind  learns  to  present  the  deeds  which  it  wished 
to  do  or  to  avoid  in  a  false  light.  Certain  features  of  the  deed  are 
brought  out  into  prominent  relief,  and  others  are  as  studiously  hid 
from  the  view.  The  conscience  is  led  in  consequence  to  approve 
of  that  which  is  evil,  and  condemn  that  which  is  good.  Hence 
we  find  multitudes  rushing  eagerly  to  what  is  evil,  yet  carefully 
keeping  the  more  painful  part  of  the  evil  out  of  view,  as  the 
priests  in  Mexico  rung  the  gong  to  drown  the  cries  of  the  human 
victims  offered  in  sacrifice. 

From  these  two,  and  it  may  be  from  other  causes;  we  find  the 
conscience  operating  in  a  number  of  perverted  ways  in  the  hu- 
man breast. 

FlRST,    THERE    IS    AN    UNENLIGHTENED    CONSCIENCE.        The 

mind  makes  no  inquiry  into  the  objects  presented  to  it ;  but  taking 
them  as  they  come,  the  conscience  decides  upon  them  as  they 
cast  up.  Persons  under  this  influence  act  according  to  the  pre- 
vailing views  of  their  age  and  country,  without  making  any  nice 
inquiry  into  their  accuracy.  They  follow  religiously  the  supersti- 
tions of  their  country  ;  they  practice  faithfully  the  virtues  of  their 
family  or  tribe — be  they  hospitality,  or  courage,  or  whatever  else ; 
and  they  allow  themselves  to  fall  into  the  vices  that  abound 
around  them — it  may  be  intemperance,  or  revenge-^and  they 
scarcely  feel  any  compunctions  in  consequence.  It  is  the  least 
sinful  form  which  the  conscience  takes  in  fallen  man.  Yet  it  is 
not  without  sin.  The  mind  avoids  inquiry,  because  it  does  not 
wish  to  be  disturbed.  It  is  in  darkness,  because  it  prefers  the 
darkness  to  the  light.  The  conscience,  in  such  persons,  loses  all 
delicacy  of  perception  and  touch ;  and  the  possessor  does  good 
without  doing  it  as  good,  and  evil  without  knowing  that  it  is 
evil. 

SECONDLY,  THERE  is  A  PERVERTED  CONSCIENCE.  This 
form  differs  from  the  others  only  in  degree.  It  is  a  farther  stage 
of  the  same  malady.  There  is  not  only  ignorance,  there  is  posi- 
tive mistake.  Nor  is  it  difficult,  according  to  the  principles  above 
developed,  to  discover  how  the  conscience  should  come  to  pro- 
nounce judgments  which  are  positively  erroneous.  Not  that  the 
conscience  can  be  made  to  pronounce  an  erroneous  sentence,  when 
the  circumstances  are  faithfully  represented  to  it ;  but  it  is  the 
worst  feature  of  human  nature  that  the  faculties  deceive  each 


384  STATE    OP    THE    CONSCIENCE    IN 

other,  and  have  entered  into  a  conspiracy  to  delude  the  moral 
sense.  Under  the  influence  of  prejudice  arid  passion,  the  mind 
views  every  object  only  under  some  one,  and  that  a  very  partial 
aspect.  Objects  really  loved  on  other  grounds,  come  in  imagina- 
tion to  be  invested  with  qualities  which  do  not  belong  to  them  ; 
and  we  are  led,  not  only  to  desire  these  objects,  but  to  justify  our- 
selves in  desiring  them.  Men  will  fight  for  persons  and  causes 
altogether  unworthy  of  esteem,  because  they  identify  them  with 
something  that  is  good,  and  they  will  do  so  with  unflinching  fidel- 
ity and  the  deepest  devotedness,  thinking  that  they  do  God  ser- 
vice. On  the  other  hand,  when  the  person  is  under  the  feeling  of 
malice  or  revenge,  all  the  actions  of  the  obnoxious  party  will  be 
seen  as  through  broken  and  colored  crystal.  "  It  would  be  curious 
to  see  how  a  respectful  estimate  of  a  man's  character  and  talents 
might  be  changed,  in  consequence  of  some  personal  inattention 
experienced  from  him,  into  deprecating  invectives  against  him  or 
his  intellectual  performances ;  and  the  railler,  though  actuated 
solely  by  petty  revenge,  account  himself  all  the  while  the  model 
of  equity  and  sound  judgment."*  Having  succeeded  in  repre- 
senting those  whom  we  dislike  in  jaundiced  colors  and  distorted 
forms,  we  feel  now  as  if  we  were  not  only  allowed,  but  justified 
in  the  opposition  offered  them.  Malignity  never  becomes  deep  or 
bitter,  till  it  has  succeeded  in  calling  in  the  conscience  ;  and  men 
feel  as  if  they  did  right  to  be  angry.  Mankind  always  misrep- 
resent those  whom  they  hate,  as  Nero  clothed  with  the  skins  of 
wild  beasts  those  on  whom  he  let  loose  the  dogs  that  tore  them  to 
pieces,  and  covered  with  pitch  those  that  were  consumed  by  the 
flames. 

In  consequence  of  these  aberrations,  willing,  in  the  first  in- 
stance, the  mind  gets  into  a  hopelessly  perverted  state,  calling 
good  evil,  and  evil  good.  A  deep  but  somewhat  gloomy  thinker, 
John  Foster,  says,  "  it  were  probably  absurd  to  expect  that  any 
mind  should  itself  be  able  to  detect  all  its  own  obliquities,  after 
having  been  so  long  beguiled,  like  the  mariners  in  a  story  which 
I  have  read,  who  followed  the  direction  of  their  compas%  infalli- 
bly right,  as  they  could  have  no  doubt,  till  they  arrived  at  an 
enemy's  port,  where  they  were  seized  and  made  slaves.  It  hap- 
pened that  the  wicked  captain,  in  order  to  betray  the  ship,  had 
concealed  a  large  loadstone  at  a  little  distance  on  one  side  of  the 
needle."  t  The  illustration  is  most  apposite  of  the  constant 
*  Foster  on  a  Man's  Writing  Memoirs  of  Himself.  f  Ibid. 


THE    DEPRAVED    NATURE.  385 

power  of  a  sinful  will,  like  this  concealed  loadstone,  to  draw 
aside  the  conscience  from  its.  proper  bearing  and  direction,  and 
lead  the  possessor  astray  while  he  thinks  he  is  holding  on  in  the 
proper  path. 

We  can  thus  account  for  those  extraordinary  perversions  of 
moral  feeling  by  which  certain  religious  sects  are  characterized. 
The  delusion  caused  in  individuals  by  their  personal  idiosyncrasy, 
or  the  influence  of  accidental  circumstances,  is  produced  in  these 
sects  by  a  skilfully  arranged  system,  the  prime  movers  in  which 
deceive  others  by  the  same  means  by  which  they  were  themselves 
deceived.  In  all  such  cases  it  may*be  remarked,  that  there  are 
two  necessary  means  employed — there  is  the  placing  in  the  fore- 
ground of  an  acknowledged  virtue  before  the  mind,  and  there  is  a 
course  of  training.  By  this  virtue  the  moral  faculty  is  gained ; 
and  by  the  training,  the  mind  is  taught  to  look  at  this  virtue,  and 
tfie  advantages  flowing  from  the  exercise,  while  other  and  offensive 
aspects  are  studiously  kept  out  of  view.  Thus,  in  the  Society  of 
Jesus  there  is  placed  before  the  mind  the  duty  of  serving  Christ, 
the  virtue  of  submission  to  a  superior,  and  the  advantages  thence 
accruing  of  centralization,  and  the  energy  of  united  action ;  and 
then  there  is  a  system  of  discipline,  with  a  studious  secrecy,  and 
disclosures  according  as  the  parties  are  able  to  bear  it.  In  Thug- 
gery it  was  proclaimed  that  the  sacrifice  of  human  life  is  sacred  to 
the  Goddess  of  Destruction,  and  that  the  strangled  go  to  Paradise, 
and  none  were  allowed  to  witness  the  horrid  rites  till  the  third  year 
of  their  apprenticeship. 

These  are  the  workings  of  the  conscience,  in  regard  to  its  more 
direct  office  of  pointing  out  the  path  of  duty.  In  its  more  reflex 
operation,  as  judging  of  the  past  character  of  the  possessor,  it  may 
assume  one  or  other  of  two  forms,  as — 

THIRDLY,  THERE  is  AN  UNFAITHFUL  CONSCIENCE,  or  a  con- 
science which  does  not  inform  man  of  his  sins.  It  is  the  most 
dangerous  of  all  its  delusions.  It  arises  from  the  painful  nature' 
of  the  emotions  which  the  contemplation  of  sin  calls  up,  and  the 
effort  which  the  mind  makes  to  avoid  or  deaden  the  sensation. 
Hence  the  unwillingness  to  look  seriously  at  the  evil  committed  ; 
and  hence  the  attempt  to  keep  it  out  of  sight,  and  to  b'ury  it,  if 
possible,  in  forgetfulness.  There  issue  from  all  this  a  deceitfulness 
of  heart,  and  a  cast  of  character  completely  opposed  to  that  which 
we  describe  expressively  as  single-minded.  These  self-delusions 
may  be  observed  not  only  in  those  who  are  possessed  of  remark- 

25 


* 


386  STATE    OF    THE    CONSCIENCE    IN 

able  talents  and  lively  sensibility,  but  even  in  clowns  and  simple- 
tons. Those  who  possess  no  other  talent  are  often  proverbial  for 
the  exercise  of  a  kind  of  cunning  which  displays  itself  in  their 
hiding  their  faults  from  others,  and  derived,  we  are  convinced,  from 
the  skill  -which  they  have  acquired  in  deluding  themselves.  Per- 
sons who  have  long  practised  this  habit  of  self-deception  come  at 
last  to  look  upon  themselves  with  the  most  complacent  self-satis- 
faction. The  greatest  criminals  have  been  known  to  pass  years 
of  their  life  without  being  visited  with  any.  very  deep  or  conscious 
convictions  of  conscience.  If  certain  persons  can  thus  commit  the 
most  heinous  crimes  without  *being  much  troubled  with  the  con- 
sciousness of  sin,  it  is  worthy  of  being  inquired  wKether  it  is  not  in 
consequence  of  a  general  property  of  man's  nature  operating  in 
the  breasts  of  all,  and  leading  them  to  conceal  their  sins  from 
themselves.  Does  it  not  seem  as  if,  through  this  human  charac- 
teristic, all  mankind  might  be  sinners,  and  lying  under  the  dis- 
pleasure of  God,  and  yet  utterly  unconscious  of  their  awful  and 
perilous  state? 

Mankind,  in  general  and  in  ordinary  circumstances,  are  won- 
derfully little  troubled  with  reproaches  of  conscience — as  little,  we 
believe,  as  the  Jesuit  is  in  practising  deceit,  and  the  Thug  in  per- 
petrating his  murders,  and  for  a  like  reason  : — the  conscience  has 
been  so  muffled  that  no  warning  sound  can  come  from  it.  Some 
have  gone  down  to  yet  greater  depths,  far  beneath  the  reach 
of  any  disturbing  sound — like  those  depths  of  the  ocean  "which 
are  beneath  all  agitation,  but  in  which  there  is  no  life — like  those 
coal-pits  into  which  it  is  impossible  to  draw  the  air,  and  in  which, 
therefore,  all  life  must  perish. 

FOURTHLY,  THERE  is  A  TROUBLED  CONSCIENCE.  There  is 
a  fact  or  fable  alluded'  to  by  SouSey,  in  one  of  his  poems,  con- 
cerning a  bell  suspended  on  a  rock  of  the  ocean  dangerous  to  navi- 
gation, that  the  sound  given  as  the  waves  beat  upon  it  might 
'warn  the  mariner  of  his  propinquity  to  danger — there  is  a  story, 
we  say,  of  the  pirates  cutting  this  bell  because  of  the  warning 
sound  which  it  uttered.  It  so  happened,  however,  that  at  a  fu- 
ture period  these  very  pirates  struck  upon  that  rock  which  they 
had  stript  of  its  means  of  admonishing  them.  Which  things  may 
be  unto  us  for  an  allegory.  Mankind  take  pains  to  stifle  the  voice 
that  would  admonish  them,  and  they  partially  succeed,  but  it  is 
only  to  find  themselves  sinking  at  last  in  the  more  fearful  misery. 

There  are  violent  and  convulsive  movements  of  self-reproach 


THE    DEPRAVED   NATtJRE.  387 

which  will  at  all  times  break  in  upon  the  self-satisfaction  of  the 
most  complacent.  Man's  peace  is  in  this  respect  like  the  sultry 
heat  of  a  summer  day ;  it  is  close  and  disagreeable  at  the  time, 
and  ever  liable  to  be  broken  in  upon  by  the  thunders  and  tempests 
of  the  Divine  indignation.  Even  in  the  case  of  those  who  are 
anxious  to  keep  their  attention  as  much  as  possible  out  of  them- 
selves, and  as  little  as  possible  upon  the  state  of  their  hearts,  there 
will  occur  intervals  unfilled  up  between  the  scenes  that  engross 
them,  and  on  these  occasions  there  will  be  recollections  called  up 
which  they  cannot  away  with.  It  may  be  after  a  day  of  selfish 
business,  or  an  evening  of  sinful  excitement,  that  such  unwelcome 
visitations  are  paid  to  them  to  disturb  their  rest,  while  others  have 
buried  their  cares  in  the  forgetfulness  of  sleep.  Or  it  may  be,  in 
the  time  of  disease,  or  in  the  prospect  of  death,  that  the  ghosts  of 
deeds  committed  long  ago  spring  up  as  from  the  grave.  These 
gloomy  fears  proceeding  from  conscious  guilt  thus  always  rise  up 
like  a  ghostly  apparition,  never  in  the  sunshine  of  prosperity,  but 
always  in  the  gloom  of  adversity,  to  render  the  darkness  more 
horrific.  The  wicked  are  thus,  in  the  time  of  prosperity,  heaping 
up  an  accumulated  sorrow,  to  aggravate  the  scenes  of  misery 
through  which  they  must  at  last  pass.  They  are  vainly  attempt- 
ing to  stop  the  current  altogether  by  a  feeble  mound  which,  as  it 
gives  way,  lets  in  the  waters  upon  the  soul  with  the  power  of  an 
overwhelming  flood. 

A  number  of  circumstances  combine  to  force  sin  upon  the  notice, 
even  when  there  is  a  general  desire  to  overlook  it.  External  ob- 
jects and  events  may  frequently  make  it  pass  in  review  before  the 
spectator.  More  frequently  it  is  excited  feeling  that  keeps  it  con- 
stantly and  habitually  before  the  mind,  so- that  turn  itself  as  it 
may,  it  ever  sees  the  deed  standing  out  in  colors  of  brightest  flame, 
like  a  lurid  light  glaring  in  the  midst  of  darkness,  and  attracting 
the  eye,  though  only  to  pain  and  annoy  it.  A  crime  long  con- 
cealed from  the  public  eye  has  at  length,  let  us  suppose,  been  de- 
tected, the  indignation  of  the  whole  community  is  excited,  and  the 
finger  of  reproach  is  pointed  at  the  perpetrator.  It  is  manifest 
that  he  cannot  now  banish  the  recollection  of  the  offence  so  con- 
stantly or  effectually  as  he  was  wont.  It  will  rise  up  anew  with 
every  feeling  of  wounded  vanity,  and  whenever  he  is  exposed  to 
studied  neglect  or  insult.  We  can  account,  on  precisely  the  same 
principles,  for  a  seemingly  contradictory  phenomenon,  the  great 
annoyance  given  by  the  conscience  in  cases  in  which  constant 


388  STATE    OF    THE    CONSCIENCE,    ETC. 

exertion  requires  to  be  made  to  keep  the  crime  concealed.  The 
very  attempt  at  concealment,  according  to  the  natural  law  of  as- 
sociation, must  keep  the  deed  perpetually  before  the  mind  to 
awaken  the  conscience  and  madden  the  soul.  The  man  who  has 
such  a  fearful  secret  to  keep  has  a  fire  in  his  bosom  which  he  is 
"  gathering  to  keep  it  warm  ;"  and  he  would  riot  be  lacerated  by 
the  lash  of  public  reprobation  so  fearfully  as  by  these  scorpions  of 
his  own  exasperated  conscience. 

The  sin  is  also  kept  before  the  mind,  and  the  conscience  troubled, 
when  there  is  any  circumstance  connected  with  the  commission 
of  the  sin,  which  is  fitted  to  move  and  excite  the  social  and  sympa- 
thetic emotions.  When  the  shrieks  of  the  murdered,  for  instance, 
ring  for  years  in  the  ears  of  the  murderer,  the  mind  must  needs 
be  in  a  state  of  constant  restlessness— the  burning  centre  of  the 
most  intense  anguish. 

In  other  cases,  the  troubling  of  the  conscience  is  produced,  we 
can  scarcely  tell  how,  by  the  state  of  the  nervous  system,  or  by  an 
accidental  event,  recalling  the  deed  committed  to  oblivion,  or  by 
a  sudden  flashing  of  some  willingly  forgotten  scene  upon  the  mind, 
revealing,  like  the  lightning's  glare  at  night,  dreadful  depths  of 
darkness.  In  regard  to  such  phenomena,  we  may  know  what  are 
the  general  laws;  though  it  may  be  as  difficult  to  condescend 
upon  the  specific  causes,  as  it  is  to  tell  the  immediate  cause  of 
raising  this  gust  of  wind,  or  of  this  cloudy  atmosphere,  of  both  of 
which  we  may  yet  know  perfectly  the  general  means  of  their 
support. 

The  swelling  of  the  passions  has  often  been  compared  very  ap- 
propriately to  the  swelling  of  the  waves  of  the  ocean.  The  re- 
proaches of  conscience  may  be  compared  rather  to  the  ground 
swell,  thus  described  by  an  eloquent  scientific  female  writer : — "  It 
continues  to  heave  the  smooth  and  glassy  surface  of  the  deep,  long- 
after  the  winds  and  billows  are  at  rest.  A  swell  frequently  comes 
from  a  quarter  in  direct  opposition  to  the  wind  ;  and  sometimes 
from  various  points  of  the  compass  at  the  same  time,  producing  a 
vast  commotion  in  a  dead  sea  without  ruffling  the  surface.  They 
are  the  heralds  that  point  out.  to  the  manner  the  distant  region 
where  the  tempest  has  howled,  arid  they  are  not  unfrequently  the 
harbingers  of  its  approach."*  Every  word  of  this  description  might 
be  applied  to  those  reproaches,  which  coming  from  various  quarters^ 
and  rising  at  a  great  distance,  move  the  soul  far  beneath  its  sur- 
*  Somerville's  Physical  Geography. 


RESTRAINTS    LAID    UPON    MAN.  389 

faee,  and  tell  at  once  of  sin  that  may  be  long  passed,  and  of  storms 
yet  to  arise. 

Sometimes  these  reproaches  are  but  momentary  flashes,  extin- 
guished^n  darkness ;  at  other  times,  they  are  a  constant  firing. 
Human  misery  is  consummated,  when  the  gnawings  become  con- 
stant, eating  like  a  cancer  ever  inwards.  The  memory  of  sin  is 
now  the  only  object  on  which  the  mind  can  fix.  The  conscience 
unceasingly  chides,  and  all  its  chidings  are  prolonged  and  re- 
peated as  by  surrounding  echoes.  An  avenging  power  is  seen 
ever  hovering  over  the  soul,  like  a  bird  of  prey  over  its  victim. 
Who  can  describe  to  others  the  pain  produced,  when  these  con- 
victions coil  around  the  mind  as  serpents  coiled  around  Laocoon  1 
Nor  can  any  change  of  scene  or  position  lessen  or  distract  the 
misery.  You  may  recommend  scenes  of  mirth  and  amusement ; 
but  their  very  music  grates  upon  the  ear.  and  it  is  as  the  "  singing 
of  songs  to  a  heavy  heart."  You  may  recommend  the  beauties  of 
nature — the  bracing  breeze,  and  the  gladdening  sunshine ;  the 
stream  fitted  to  make  the  heart  to  leaf  as  lively  as  itself,  and  the 
mountain,  whose  air  becomes  purer  and  more  ethereal  as  we  rise 
higher  and  higher,  elevating  the  spirits  as  we  ascend,  and  expand- 
ing the  mind  as  the  prospect  widens — we  may  recommend  the 
ocean,  the  sight  and  sound  of  which  are  ever  as  fresh  to  the  ex- 
hausted spirit,  as  the  breeze  which  blows  from  it  is  to  the  ex- 
hausted body  ;  but  it  is  all  to  no  purpose,  as  long  as  there  is  within 
"  the  fires  that  scorch,  yet  dare  not  shine." 

It  is  the  world  within  that  needs  to  be  rectified,  and  then  it  will 
gladden  the  world  without,  as  by  a  perpetual  sunshine  streaming 
upon  it.  But  this  rectification  must  proceed  from  a  higher  power 
than  the  perverted  mind  of  man. 


SECTION  VII.— RESTRAINTS  LAID  UPON  MAN  BY  THE  CONSCIENCE— 
THEIR  EXTENT  AND  CHARACTER. 

Though  man  is  fallen,  there  is  abundant  scope  for  the  exercise 
of  many  of  the  original  properties  of  his  nature.  Every  one 
acknowledges,  for  instance,  that  there  is  room  for  the  play  of  the 
ingenuity  and  fancy  in  man's  existing  nature,  and  that  the  sym- 
pathetic and  social  affections  may  be  as  strong  and  lively  as  ever. 
We  maintain,  farther,  that  in  not  a  few  cases,  the  conscience  is 
making  its  power  felt  in  the  way  of  instigating  to  what  is  good, 
and  restraining  human  wickedness.  It  cannot  be  denied  that 


390 


RESTRAINTS    LAID    UPON   MAN 


great  and  beneficial  ends  are  produced  in  the  government  of  the 
world  by  the  exercise  of  this  faculty,  weak  and  imperfect  though 
it  be.  But  let  us  properly  understand  in  what  sense,  and  under 
what  restrictions,  the  admission  is  made.  A 

The  possession  of  conscience  does  not  make  any  man  morally 
good,  yet  it  undoubtedly  renders  every  man  a  responsible  agent. 
It  would  be  an  evident  error  to  affirm,  that  if  man  were  without 
a  conscience,  he  would  commit  a  greater  amount  of  wickedness ; 
for  if  so  constituted,  he  could  as  little  be  capable  of  moral  evil,  as 
of  moral  excellence.  But  if  we  cannot,  with  any  propriety  of  lan- 
guage, affirm,  that  without  the  possession  of  the  conscience,  hu- 
man wickedness  would  have  been  greater  than  it  is  ;  it  is  perfectly 
competent  to  assert,  that  without  such  a  restraint,  human  passion 
would  have  raged  more  furiously,  and  the  human  misery  produced 
would  have  been  vastly  more  extensive.  The  conscience,  weak 
and  perverted  though  it  be,  is  one  instrument  employed  by  God  to 
hold  mankind  in  subjection  in  spite  of  their  wickedness.  Bacon 
speaks  of  it  "  as  sufficient  to  check  the  vice,  but  not  to  inform  the 
duty."  This  broken  rudder  is  not  capable  of  conducting  the  vessel 
into  the  harbor ;  but  may  be  used  for  preventing  it,  till  certain 
ends  have  been  accomplished,  from  dashing  upon  the  rocks. 
"We  believe,"  says  Vinet,  "in  the  wreck  of  humanity  ;  we  believe 
that  its  unfortunate  ship  has  perished,  but  that  the  remains  of  that 
great  catastrophe  float  on  the  waves.  A  few  of  these  are  fit  for 
some  use,  but  none  of  them  can  bear  to  the  shore  the  least  of  the 
passengers." 

Ill  many  cases,  there  is  direct  obedience  \  not  indeed  full  and 
constant,  but  partial  and  occasional,  to  the  dictates  of  the  con- 
science. Let  it  be  acknowledged  frankly,  and  without  any  mental 
reservation  whatsoever,  that  there  is  in  society  much  sterling 
honesty,  proceeding  from  conscientious  integrity  of  character,  and 
not  from  any  discovery  of  the  advantages  which  may  spring  from 
the  course  of  conduct  pursued.  Not  only  so,  there  is  in  many  a 
high  sense  of  honor,  and  a  noble-minded  generosity  of  character, 
originating  in  a  largeness  of  heart,  and  guided  by  an  acute  sense 
of  right  and  wrong,  which  command  our  esteem  and  admiration. 
We  always  suspect  the  man  who  sneers  at  the  idea  of  the  exist- 
ence of  human  integrity  and  benevolence,  that  he  is  himself  the 
villain  which  he  believes  others  to  be.  Now,  it  needs  but  a  mo- 
ment's reflection  to  discover,  how  much  the  peace  and  general 
well-being  of  society  are  promoted  by  the  belief  in  this  high  honoi 


BY   THE    CONSCIENCE.  391 

and  disinterested  philanthropy.  Though  society  could  be  held 
together  in  a  sort  of  way  by  the  restraints  of  God's  providence,  yet 
it  would  be  a  sad  scene  of  constant  jealousy,  but  for  the  mutual 
confidence  engendered  by  the  existence  of  sterling  honor  and  gen- 
erous lov«. 

These,  then,  are  the  restraints  laid  upon  human  wretchedness, 
by  a  salutary  fear  of  the  pain  which  the  reproaches  of  conscience 
communicate.  This  pain  is  known  by  experience  to  be  one  of  the 
deepest  and  most  intense  to  which  the  human  mind  can  be  ex- 
posed ;  and  the  prudent  man  will  avoid  everything  that  might 
incur  it,  as  carefully  as  he  would  turn  away  from  threatened 
bodily  suffering.  None  but  the  great  Governor,  who  uses  these 
means  for  the  furtherance  of  good  order  in  the  world,  can  tell  how 
great  the  restraint  which  is  thereby  laid  on  the  excesses  of  human 
wickedness. 

But  while  it  is  freely  admitted  that  the  peace  and  decorum  of 
society  are  thereby  greatly  furthered,  we  are  not  to  leap  rashly  to 
the  conclusion  that  human  nature  is  spotlessly  pure.  The  disor- 
ganization of  the  mind  may  be  discovered  in  the  very  character 
of  the  restraints  which  the  conscience  imposes.  The  character  of 
the  disease  is  indicated  in  the  very  nature  of  the  food  which  is 
craved.  There  is  a  favoritism  displayed  where  all  may  seem  to 
be  candor,  and  the  partiality  of  the  judge  comes  out  in  the  selec- 
tion of  the  cases  in  which  a  righteous  judgment  is  pronounced. 

Let  us  mark  the  peculiarities  of  those  cases  in  which  the  con- 
science is  in  the  way  of  controlling  the  mind,  and  directing  it  aright. 
As  a  general  rule,  it  is  most  disposed  to  do  so  when  the  sin,  after 
commission,  would  be  forced  most  readily  and  frequently  upon 
the  cognizance  of  the  conscience.  As  for  instance — 

First,  when  it  is  known  that  external  circumstances  must  force 
the  sin  upon  the  attention.  Mankind  in  general  avoid  those  sins 
which,  when  committed,  must  be  constantly  recalled  by  events 
ever  occurring.  Nor  is  there  need  of  any  profound  reasoning  to 
discover  what  sins  must  thus  bring  so  immediate  a  punishment — 
the  mind  discovers  them  at  once,  and  flees  from  them  as  naturally 
and  spontaneously,  as  it  would  from  a  precipice  or  any  manifest 
bodily  peril.  It  is  in  consequence  of  this  salutary  awe  that  we 
find  external  sins  avoided  by  persons  who  yet  cherish  the  sinful 
feeling  and  purpose.  Lewd  thoughts,  malice,  and  revenge  are 
mentally  indulged  in  by  thousands  who  refrain  from  perpetrating 
the  corresponding  deed,  and  this  not  merely  from  a  perception  of 


392  RESTRAINTS    LAID    UPON    MAN 

the  reproach  with  which  they  would  be  visited  by  their  fellow-men 
upon  the  act  becoming  manifest,  but  because  of  the  chiding  of 
their  own  hearts  called  up  by  the  public  notice  taken  of  them. 
Hence  it  is  likewise  that  there  is  commonly  a  restraint  on  those 
sins  which  call  forth  instantly  the  reprobation  of  society.  Now, 
those  offences  are  most  keenly  condemned  which -inflict  immediate 
injury  on  the  temporal  interests  of  mankind.  Deceit  and  dis- 
honesty, and  the  kindred  vices,  are  those  which  are  most  deeply 
felt  by  society  as  inflicting  the  'greatest  amount  of  injury,  and 
these  are  the  vices  which  the  wise  and  prudent  man  is  most  dis- 
posed to  avoid.  Hence  the  straightforward  honesty  and  sensitive 
honor  so  characteristic  of  our  higher  class  of  men  of  business.  It 
would  be  altogether  a  miserable  fetch  to  impute  this,  their  distin- 
guishing quality,  to  a  mere  refinement  of  selfishness — it  proceeds 
rather  from  a  becoming  fear  of  the  accusations  of  a  conscientious 
mind. 

It  is  for  a  like  reason  that  we  find  the  general  tone  of  morality 
in  society  exercising  a  prodigious  influence  on  the  individual 
members  of  it.  When  the  standard  of  honor  and  virtue  is  high 
in  a  community — when,  for  instance,  unbecoming  levity  in  the 
female  sex,  and  everything  mean  on  the  part  of  the  higher  classes 
of  society  is  severely  reprobated,  and  industry  and  honesty  are 
commended  among  the  poor — then  we  may  find  a  shrinking  from 
all  those  violations  of  established  propriety,  which  would  expose 
the  individual  not  only  to  the  scorn  of  men's  tongues,  but,  along 
with  that,  to  what  is  more  fearful,  the  gnawings  of  a  dissatisfied 
mind.  On  the  other  hand,  when  the  standard  of  society  is  low — 
when  no  mark  of  disgrace  is  attached  to  unchastity,  to  meanness, 
or  to  dishonesty — we  find  persons  falling  greedily  into  these  sins, 
and  contriving  easily  to  avoid  the  reproaches  of  conscience.  A 
member  of  a  community  of  robbers  or  pirates  can,  with  compara- 
tively little  self-reproach,  inflict  injury  on  society  at  large  every 
day  of  his  life,  and  his  compunctions  become  acute  only  when  he 
is  tempted  to  act  unfaithfully  towards  that  band  with  which  he  is 
associated.  Hence  we  find  criminals  perpetrating  without  much 
remorse  the  most  enormous  crimes  against  mankind  at  large,  and 
yet  maintaining  a  nice  senss  of  honor  in  reference  to  one  another. 
This,  too,  is  a  cause  (additional  to  that  before  noticed)  of  the  cir- 
cumstance that  mankind  in  general  are  honest  and  upright  in 
their  transactions  with  one  another,  while  they  are  utterly  un- 
grateful and  rebellious  in  their  conduct  towards  God,  their  govev- 


BY   THE    CONSCIENCE.  393 

nor  and  best  benefactor.  Must  there  not  be  some  fearful  derange- 
ment in  man's  nature  when  his  sins  are  weighed,  not  in  the  un- 
changeable scale  of  God's  law,  but  in  the  varying  scale  of  ever- 
shifting  circumstances? 

Secondly,  sins  are  avoided  when  the  social  and  sympathetic 
feelings  of  man's  nature  tend  to  recall  them  frequently  and  viv- 
idly. The  feelings  now  referred  to  will  fall  to  be  considered  in  the 
next  Chapter.  They  are  in  themselves  different  from  the  moral 
feelings,  and  are  commonly  far  more  powerful,  owing  to  their  live- 
liness, .in  their  influence  upon  the  character.  They  must  give  a 
strong  bias  to  the  train  of  association  ;  and  whatever  sins  rouse 
them  into  operation,  nuist  of  necessity  be  much  before  the  mind. 
Hence  we  find  the  attention  dwelling  on  sins,  not  in  proportion  to 
their  greatness,  but  according  as  they  may  have  excited  and  in- 
terested the  emotions.  Hence  we  find  in  all  minds  not  utterly 
abandoned  an  instinctive  shuddering  at  crimes  which  produce 
instantly  bodily  suffering  or  mental  anguish,  fitted  to  move  the 
more  tender  feelings  of  man's  nature.  It  is  owing  to  this  cause, 
perhaps,  more  than  to  the  healthy  working  of  the  conscience  con- 
sidered in  itself,  that  we  find  the  murderer,  the  seducer,  and  the 
defrauder  of  the  simple,  haunted  by  such  fearful  reproaches,  with 
nothing  to  lessen  or  alleviate  them.  We  can  believe  all  that  is 
said  about  the  murderer  feeling  as  if  the  stain  of  the  blood  of  his 
victim  could  never  be  washed  out,  and  as  if  he  saw  the  wounds 
ever  open,  and  blood  flowing  from  them.  It  is  pleasant  to  think 
that  the  widow,  the  orphan,  the  poor,  and  the  afflicted  have  thus 
a  powerful  friend,  not  only  in  the  sympathetic  feelings  of  every 
man's  bosom,  but  in  the  moral  sense  called  up  by  these  feelings  to 
the  discharge  of  its  duties.  This  is  one  of  the  helps  which  God 
provides  for  the  helpless,  one  of  the  most  potent  defences  of  the 
defenceless. 

We  now  see  in  what  circumstances  the  conscience  is  apt  to  be 
deadened,  and  in  what  circumstances  it  is  apt  to  be  roused.  We 
see  how  mankind  can  continue  in  a  most  apathetic  state  in  ref- 
erence to  sins  of  which  the  whole  race  is  guilty,  while  they  are 
sensitive  as  to  other  sins,  less  heinous,  it  may  be,  but  which  are 
generally  abhorred.  We  see,  too,  why  certain  sins  come  to  weigh 
heavily  on  the  mind,  while  others  are  speedily  forgotten. 

Great  crimes  alarm  the  conscience,  but  she  sleeps 
While  thoughtful  man  is  plausibly  amused. 

CoWPKft. 


394 


ON  THE  EVIL  EFFECTS  PRODUCED 


These  great  crimes,  which  alarm  the  conscience,  are  commonly 
deeds  which  arouse  the  sympathies  or  startle  the  sensibilities  of 
mankind  ;  but  the  other  sins,  which  he  forgets,  are  sins  which  in 
no  way  move  the  common  interests  of  humanity.  We  see  like- 
wise how  sins  forgotten  for  a  time  may  be  made  to  flash  before 
the  mind  by  the  recalling  of  associated  circumstances,  or  how 
they  may  be  steadfastly  forced  upon  the  attention  by  the  power 
of  associated  feelings.  This  topic  will  fall  to  be  resumed  in 
next  section. 

But  in  considering  how  these  circumstances  bear  upon  the  gov- 
ernment of  God,  it  is  worthy  of  being  noticed,  that  by  their  means 
God  can  effectually  restrain  the  vices  which  are  most  fitted  to 
have  an  injurious  influence  upon  society.  In  proportion  as  so- 
ciety is  injured  is  its  indignation  roused,  and  in  that  same  propor- 
tion is  the  conscience  roused  to  denounce  the  perpetrator  of  the 
evil ;  and  in  proportion  as  pain  is  inflicted  so  are  the  sympathetic 
feelings  of  the  guilty  party  moved,  and,  in  awakening  the  sympa- 
thies, there  are  awakened  at  the  same  time  the  more  terrible 
pangs  of  an  accusing  conscience.  Does  it  not  seem  as  if  God 
were  using  the  very  wrecks  of  man's  nature  to  keep  him  from 
sinking  altogether,  and  making  the  sinfulness  as  he  makes  the 
wrath  of  man  to  praise  him  ? 

SECTION  VIIL— ON  THE  EVIL  EFFECTS  PRODUCED  BY  A  CONDEMN- 
ING  CONSCIENCE. 

The  sad  effects  that  follow  from  a  falsely  approving  conscience, 
producing  a  self-deceived,  self-satisfied  temper  of  mind,  have  al- 
ready been  pointed  out.  We  are  now  to  contemplate  the  evil 
effects  which  originate  in  a  condemning  conscience.  These  are 
greater  and  more  numerous  than  the  superficial  observer  is  apt  to 
imagine.  Their  source  lies  deep  down  in  the  human  heart,  and 
is  therefore  unseen,  but  is  on  that  account  the  more  tremendously 
powerful. 

We  are  inclined  to  refer  much  of  the  discontent  which  abounds 
in  the  world  to  the  influence  of  an  unsatisfied  conscience.  As 
repeated  neglects  of  duty  pass  under  the  notice  of  the  mind,  there 
is  a  wretchedness  ever  renewed,  though  very  possibly  without  the 
individual  being  at  all  aware  of  the  source  from  which  it  springs. 
In  this  respect  it  resembles  the  constant  uneasiness  produced  by 
the  derangement  of  the  digestive  organs,  or  the  irritation  caused 
by  a  diseased  nervous  system.  The  reproaches  of  conscience, 


BY    A   CONDEMNING   CONSCIENCE.  395 

though  individually  transient,  do  yet,  by  their  recurrence,  exer- 
cise a  powerful  influence.  They  resemble  those  noxious  ephemera, 
which  make  up  in  number  what  they  want  in  strength ;  and 
while  the  individuals  perish,  the  genus  survives.  By  their  con- 
stant renewal  they  disturb  the  flow  of  association  in  the  mind, 
and  dispose  it  to  anxiety  and  fretfulness.  An  accusing  conscience 
must  thus  ever  be  rendering  the  possessor  restless  and  unhappy, 
We  refer  to  this  cause  much  of  what  we  call  temper,  both  of  peev- 
ish and  violent  temper.  True,  the  individual  may  not  know  the 
quarter  from  which  the  restlessness  which  he  feels  proceeds,  and 
he  may  be  inclined  to  trace  it  to  every  other  source  rather  than  the 
true  one.  He  thinks  that  it  arises  from  his  condition,  and  hence  his 
constant  endeavors  to  better  his  position,  to  free  himself  from  cer- 
tain external  inconveniences,  and  to  attain  certain  temporal  priv- 
ileges ;  or  he  refers  it  to  the  ill  usage  which  he  receives  from  man- 
kind in  general,  or  certain  individuals  who  have  thwarted  or  en- 
vied or  insulted  him,  and  hence  his  irritability  or  the  boisterous- 
ness  of  his  temper.  He  may  not  be  aware  of  it — nay,  he  might 
scout  at  the  idea  if  propounded  to  him  ;  but  nevertheless  it  is 
certain  that  the  spring  of  his  misery  is  to  be  found  in  a  conscience 
awakened  without  being  pacified. 

We  are  inclined  to  refer  not  only  much  of  human  misery,  but 
much  more  than  is  commonly  supposed  of  human  sinfulness,  to 
the  working  of  an  evil  conscience.  Much  of  human  passion  and 
human  violence  is  the  fire  and  sound  emitted  by  nature  in  its 
effort  to  restore  a  deranged  equilibrium.  Alas  !  we  cannot  even 
understand  man's  wickedness  under  some  of  its  forms  without 
taking  into  account  the  existence  of  a  moral  sense.  It  is  possible 
for  the  conscience  to  become  a  deranging  instead  of  a  regulating 
power.  When  it  does  so,  it  becomes  the  most  corrupting  of  all 
agents,  even  as  water,  so  essential  to  all  living  vegetation,  becomes 
the  most  powerful  of  all  means  of  corruption  in  a  plant  deprived, 
of  vitality. 

Whatever  rankles  the  mind — and  nothing  so  much  rankles  it 
as  an  unappeased  conscience — must  tend  to  keep  alive  the  worst 
feelings  of  the  heart.  The  fever  produced  will  prompt  to  anger 
and  ambition,  and  to  every  passion  which  may  carry  away  the 
individual  from  himself,  or  absorb  him  in  strife,  or  in  the  giddy 
whirl  of  business  or  pleasure.  An  evil  conscience  is  the  concealed 
root  of  bitterness,  from  which  spring  a  thousand  poisonous  plants 


396          ON  THE  EVIL  EFFECTS  PRODUCED 

to  shed  their  baleful  influence  upon  the  possessor,  and  upon  so- 
ciety at  large. 

And  there  are  times  when  the  sleeping  volcano  will  burst  out 
with  awful  and  irresistible  power.  "  A  wounded  spirit  who  can 

bear ;"  and  that  which  is  intolerable  within  will  find  vent  without. 

. 

When  the  mind  is  thrown  into  a  tumult — when  it  is  tossed  from 
the  lowest  depths — all  that  is  impure  will  be  cast  up  like  the 
"  troubled  sea  when  it  cannot  rest,  and  whose  waves  cast  up  mire 
and  dirt."  Some  of  the  direst  crimes  ever  committed  have  been 
prompted  by  this  laceration  of  spirit,  as  when  the  guilty  have 
sought  to  rid  themselves  of  those  who  have  been  witnesses  of  their 
crimes,  or  whose  presence  told  them  of  their  guilt,  or  whose  lives 
have  been  a  reproach  upon  their  own.  Some  of  the  incidents  of 
greatest  horror  recorded  in  history  have  originated  in  the  aversion 
of  the  mind  to  the  near  contact  of  spotless  virtue.  The  Athenian 
mob  were  allowing  more  truth  to  escape  from  them  than  man- 
kind are  accustomed  to  do,  when  they  gave  as  their  reason  for 
banishing  Aristides,  that  they  did  not  relish  the  constant  reference 
made  to  his  justice.  Not  a  few  of  the  murders  of  wives  by  their 
husbands,  and  of  husbands  by  their  wives,  have  sprung  from  a 
determination  to  be  rid  of  the  memorials  of  broken  vows.  We 
can  trace  to  no  other  source  than  a  conscience  goading  on  the 
passions  the  demoniacal  deeds  which  have  been  committed  around 
the  martyr's  funeral  pile.  So  potent  is  this  principle,  that  we  be- 
lieve it  capable  of  explaining  the  fearful  scenes  at  the  foot  of  the 
Cross,  where  the  meekest  of  sufferers  was  denied  the  sympathy 
which  has  not  been  withheld  at  a  dying  hour  even  from  the  vilest 
malefactor. 

If  we  would  understand  all  the  effects  which  follow  from  a  con- 
demning conscience,  we  must  not  forget  that  the  passions  are  often 
irritated  and  inflamed  by  the  opposition  offered  to  them.  It  is 
proverbial  that  what  is  forbidden  is  apt  to  be  the  more  eagerly 
sought  after.  Nor  is  it  difficult  to  account  for  this.  The  mind 
under  the  influence  of  desire  dwells  on  the  prohibition  and  the 
thing  prohibited,  it  becomes  more  eagerly  bent  on  obtaining  it,  and 
chafes  at  the  denial.  The  effect  of  the  interposition  of  the  con- 
science in  such  circumstances  is  only  to  exasperate  the  mind,  just 
as  the  rocks  which  do  not  impede  the  stream  serve  to  dash  it  into 
greater  violence.  The  natural  effect  of  a  monitor  warning  with- 
out being  attended  to,  must  be  an  increased  irritability  of  spirit. 
The  ocean,  even  when  the  waves  are  high,  never  seems  to  rage 


BY   A   CONDEMNING    CONSCIENCE.  397 

in  all  its  furv  except  at  the  shore,  where  it  is  opposed  by  breakers. 
The  deepest  stream  will  flow  along  softly,  and  almost  impercep- 
tibly, as  long  as  it  runs  in  a  smoothly  worn  channel ;  but  let  there 
be  opposing  rocks  or  cliffs,  which  dash  it  from  one  to  another,  and 
it  is  forthwith  lashed  into  foam.  It  is  from  a  like  cause  that  the 
rebellious  temper  of  man  rages  against  the  conscience  when  it 
would  lay  restraints  upon  him.  Paul  seems  to  refer  to  this  power 
of  an  awakened  conscience : — "  Sin  taking  occasion  by  the  com- 
mandment wrought  in  me  all  manner  of  concupiscence."  As  the 
prisoner  will  thrash  with  his  chains,  and  beat  upon  his  prison 
walls,  so  will  the  spirit  of  man  fret  and  rage  when  it  feels  its  fet- 
ters, and  yet  is  not  able  to  break  them.  It  is  the  wild  beast  beat- 
ing upon  its  cage,  and,  indignant  at  every  restraint  laid  upon  it, 
becoming  more  furious  than  when  it  ranged  in  the  forest.  Scourged 
by  remorse,  there  are  multitudes  who  have  sought  to  drown  their 
pain  by  the  most  frantic  movements.  Criminals  have  been  known, 
with  the  view  of  diverting  their  minds,  to  crack  jokes  upon  the 
scaffold.  Others  have  sought  to  madden  their  minds,  and  so  to 
ease  their  feelings,  by  rushing  into  unblushing  profligacy  and 
daring  criminality,  and  would  drown  the  remembrance  of  old  ini- 
quities by  the  noise  which  new  ones  create. 

In  other  cases,  the  mind  is  hardened  into  a  confirmed  rebellion 
against  God  and  all  that  is  good.  This  effect  follows  whenever 
the  mind  is  constrained  to  look  constantly  at  the  sins  of  which  it 
yet  does  not  repent. 

In  ordinary  circumstances  the  passions  of  the  soul,  by  means 
of  the  conspiracy  which  they  have  hatched,  contrive  to  deceive  the 
conscience,  but  they  will  not  always  be  so  successful.  Speaking 
of  the  conscience,  Bishop  Reynolds  says, — "Though  in  many  men 
it  sleep  in  regard  to  motion,  yet  it  never  sleeps  in  regard  to  obser- 
vation and  notice — it  may  be  hard  and  seared,  it  can  never  be 
blind.  That  writing  on  it,  which  seems  invisible  and  illegible, 
like  letters  written  with  the  juice  of  lemon,  when  it  is  brought  to 
the  fire  of  God's  judgments,  will  be  most  clear."*  The  time  is 
coming  when  the  mask  which  man  wears  will  be  torn  off,  and  his 
character  will  be  displayed  to  himself  in  all  its  hideousness  and 
deformity.  There  are  circumstances  occurring  in  the  world  quite 
sufficient  to  explain  what  is  here  meant. 

Let  us  look  in  the  way  of  marking  the  operations  of  the  mind 
at  those  persons  who  go  on  for  years  in  a  course  of  undetected  sin, 
*  Bishop  Reynolds  on  the  Affections. 


398          ON  THE  EVIL  EFFECTS  PRODUCED 

but  who  are  afterwards  exposed.  There  is  a  servant,  let  us  sup- 
pose, cheating-  his  master,  or  one  of  the  sex  in  which  chastity  is 
so  highly  valued,  giving  way  to  an  unlawful  lust ;  and  we  are  to 
mark  the  state  of  mind  of  such  persons,  first,  when  the  sin  is  yet 
concealed,  and  then  when  it  comes  to  be  detected  and  published. 
Though  they  will,  no  doubt,  be  troubled  all  along  with  secret  mis- 
givings and  reproaches,  it  is  astonishing  to  find  what  habitual 
calmness  they  may  assume — nay,  what  complacency  they  may 
feel,  at  least  if  they  have  had  no  difficulty  in  concealing  their  sins. 
After  the  first  awkwardness  has  been  conquered,  it  is  conceivable 
that  the  parties  may  feel  at  ease  in  the  very  presence  of  the  master 
deceived,  or  of  the  husband  to  whom  the  wife  has  proved  unfaith- 
ful. It  is  evident  that,  besides  a  studious  concealment  from  the 
eyes  of  others,  there  is  also  a  hiding  of  the  sin  from  the  eyes  of 
the  guilty  parties  themselves.  They  think  of  the  sinful  deed  as 
seldom  as  possible ;  and  when  it  is  brought  before  the  mind,  it  is 
in  a  disguised  dress  and  appearance.  Society  will  condemn  the 
deed  when  known,  and  equally  certain  is  it  that  the  conscience 
will  condemn  it  every  time  it  is  presented.  If  the  scorn  of  men 
be  difficult  to  endure,  the  constant  gnawing  of  self-reproach  is,  if 
possible,  more  difficult  to  bear.  Hence  the  ingenious  stratagems 
of  concealment  which  the 'mind  is  ever  plotting  with  at  least 
temporary  success.  The  person  acts  the  hypocrite  to  himself,  and 
uses  as  many  contrivances  to  save  appearances  before  the  censor 
within,  as  to  shield  himself  from  the  criticisms  of  the  world 
without. 

But  let  us  suppose  that  the  crime  is  now  discovered,  and  let  us 
mark  the  effect.  It  is  one  ort other  of  the  two  following: — the 
person  is  humbled  and  grieved,  and  becomes  penitent  and  reform- 
ed— or  more  commonly  the  result  is  the  very  opposite,  the  individual 
becomes  hardened,  and  sets  the  opinion  of  mankind  at  defiance. 
When  this  latter  is  the  issue,  the  individual  from  that  instant  be- 
comes more  open  and  unblushing  in  criminality  than  ever.  He 
'  acts  not  only  in  contempt  of  the  opinion  of  society,  but  in  more 
direct  rebellion  against  the  dictates  of  conscience.  The  old  mo- 
tives which  led  him  to  conceal  from  the  community  the  sins 
which  he  was  committing  have  now  lost  their  force,  and  have 
taken  with  them  almost  all  his  old  methods  of  concealing  his  sins 
from  himself,  and  now  he  sins  not  only  more  openly,  but  more 
greedily  and  recklessly.  He  feels  like  the  gambler  who  hath  lost 
at  one  venture  nearly  his  whole  property  ;  he  thinks  he  may  risk 


BY    A   CONDEMNING   CONSCIENCE.  399 

the  remainder,  it  is  so  small.  This  is  the  feeling  of  the  man 
whom  crime  hath  deprived  of  peace  of  conscience ;  he  acts  as  if 
farther  crime  could  scarcely  make  him  more  wretched  than  he  is. 

It  seems  that  there  are  cataracts  in  the  descending  stream  of 
wickedness  at  which  the  fall  is  more  tremendous  than  at  other 
places.  Let  us  take  another  illustrative  case.  Let  us  trace  the 
descent  of  a  criminal  who  has  been  hardened  by  the  sentence 
pronounced  upon  him,  and  the  punishment  to  which  he  has  been 
subjected.  Let  us  mark  how  he  goes  down  step  by  step  in  the 
scale  of  being,  and  how  the  very  interferences  with  him  are  the 
means  of  hurrying  him  down  the  faster  as  he  breaks  loose  from 
them — just  as  the  abutting  rocks  that  would  stop  the  rolling  stone 
are  often  the  means  of  making  it  take  a  more  tremendous  leap. 
Under  the  influence  of  some  transient  feeling,  not  without  crimi- 
nality, a  youth,  we  shall  suppose,  is  tempted  to  engage  in  some 
night  forray  which  ends  in  pilfering,  and  he  is  in  consequence  ap- 
prehended, condemned,  and  subjected  to  confinement  for  a  certain 
length  of  time.  It  is  a  critical  period  in  this  young  man's  history. 
Suppose  him  to  be  brought  to  true  repentance,  we  may  have  from 
this  time  a  life  of  persevering  integrity.  But  suppose,  on  the  other 
hand,  that  he  is  led  to  spurn  at  the  sentence,  and  endure  the  pen- 
alty in  a  grumbling,  rebellious  spirit ;  from  that  date  there  will,  in 
all  probability,  be  a  succession  of  crimes  leading  to  a  succession 
of  condemnations,  and  the  whole  rendering  the  heart  more  har- 
dened than  ever. 

Now,  the  issue  must  be  analogous,  in  regard  to  all  men,  when 
at  any  time  they  are  made  to  feel  deeply  and  solemnly,  be  it  in 
this  life  or  the  life  to  come,  that  God  is  calling  them  into  judgment. 
We  say  in  this  life,  because  there  are  times  in  the  history  of  the 
world,  and  in  the  history  of  every  individual,  when  God  seems  to 
be  setting  up  a  throne  of  judgment  on  the  earth,  and  calling  men 
before  it.  Certain  it  is  that  every  man  must  at  length  stand  be- 
fore the  Judge  of  the  universe.  When  thus  summoned  into  the 
presence  of  the  Governor  it  must  be  for  one  or  other  of  two  purpo- 
ses— either  to  have  his  sins  forgiven,  or  to  have  them  charged 
upon  him.  In  the  former  case  it  is  conceivable  that,  with  the  sen- 
tence of  condemnation  removed,  the  heart,  without  any  violence 
done  to  its  principles,  may  be  inclined  to  submission  and  repent- 
ance. Hence  the  appropriateness  of  the  plan  of  salvation  revealed 
in  the  Gospel,  which  disarms  rebellion  by  providing  a  free  forgive- 
ness. But  it  is  to  the  other  alternative  that  our  attention  is  now 


400  ON  THE  EVIL  EFFECTS  PRODUCED 

called.  Man,  we  suppose,  is  summoned  to  give  account  of  his 
deeds  to  a  Judge  who  cannot  possibly  be  deceived. 

Unable  to  justify  himself,  with  no  promise  of  forgiveness,  and 
no  disposition  to  repent,  the  natural  result  is  sulkiness  and  open 
rebellion.  If  there  were  room  for  deception,  the  party  might  be 
prompted  to  excuse  or  lessen  his  sin ;  and  with  the  promise  of 
forgiveness,  he  might  be  disposed  at  least  to  profess  repentance, 
and  might  have  a  momentary  desire  to  practise  it.  But  if  repent- 
ance be  impossible  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  door  of  hope  seem 
to  be  shut  on  the  other,  every  principle  of  man's  nature  will  drive 
him  on  to  the  recklessness  which  proceeds  from  conscious  guilt 
and  despair. 

Meanwhile  his  sin  will  stand  disclosed  before  him  in  all  its  hide- 
ousness,  and  with  nothing  to  conceal  it.  The  remembrance  of 
sin,  we  have  seen,  may  be  called  up  either  by  external  circum- 
stances, or  by  powerful  inward  feeling.  Both  of  these  now  com- 
bine to  keep  his  past  sin  before  him.  Why  am  I  so  situated  ?  is 
the  constant  inquiry  put ; — because  of  sin,  is  the  answer  uttered, 
as  it  were,  by  a  responsive  voice  from  our  own  bosoms.  And  these 
feelings  of  intense  anguish,  whence  come  they  ? — because  of  sin, 
is  the  reply  prolonged,  as  it  were,  by  subterranean  thunders.  But 
the  sentence  is  unnecessarily  severe.  Well,  let  me  consider  why 
it  is  inflicted.  Because  of  sin  is  the  sound  heard,  as  coming  with 
awful  solemnity  from  heaven,  and  from  the  very  mouth  of  the 
Judge.  But  this  sin  is  not  so  great  after  all,  it  is  suggested. 
Well,  let  me  examine  it.  "  Here  is  a  sin,"  is  the  voice  coming 
from  one  quarter  ; — "  here  is  a  sin,"  is  the  voice  coming  from  an- 
other quarter  ;  till  earth,  along  its  whole  visible  surface,  joins  with 
heaven  and  hell  in  ringing  the  sound  of  sin  in  the  ear. 

The  insects  that  come  from  an  ant-hill  when  it  is  stirred  are 
not  so  numerous  as  the  eager  reproaches  which  come  forth  when 
the  judgments  of  heaven  visit  the  spirit.  All  the  scenes  of  the 
past  life,  even  those  that  were  regarded  as  most  interesting  at  the 
time,  and  remembered  with  greatest  pleasure  ever  since,  are  now 
made  to  disclose  to  the  view  the  sin  involved  in  them,  but  which 
was  for  a  time  concealed  beneath  the  lovely  foliage  on  which  the 
eye  rested.  This  youthful  frolic,  which  once  communicated  such 
pleasure  in  the  remembrance — ah !  it  is  now  seen  that  it  proceeded 
from  vanity.  This  deed  of  generosity  to  man — alas  !  it  was  ac- 
companied with  an  utter  contempt  of  God  Nor  was  Fitz- James 
more  astonished,  when,  in  one  of  the  most  magnificent,  and  seem- 


BY    A    CONDEMNING    CONSCIENCE.  401 

ingly  one  of  the  most  peaceful  scenes  in  nature,  there  sprung  up 
an  armed  warrior  from  every  bush  and  brake  arid  hollow,  than 
the  person  who  has  walked  through  life  in  a  vain  show,  when  his 
sins  at  last  start  up  before  him. 

• 

"  Wild  as  the  scream  of  the  curlew 
From  crag  to  crag  the  signal  flew — 
Instant,  through  copse  and  heath,  arose 
Bonnets,  and  spears,  and  bended  bows: 
On  right,  on  left,  above,  below, 
Sprung  up  at  once  the  lurking  foe : 
From  shingles  gray  their  lances  start — 
The  bracken  bush  sends  forth  the  dart ; 
The  rushes  and  the  willow  wand 
Are  bristling  into  axe  and  brand ; 
And  every  tuft  of  broom  gives  life 
To  plaided  warrior  arm'd  for  strife — 
As  if  the  yawning  hell  to  heaven 
A  subterranean  host  had  given." 

Events  that  had  been  effaced  from  the  memory  for  years  are 
now  made  to  start  into  legibility.  There  are  facts  illustrative  of 
this  revival  of  incidents  long  forgotten.  "  I  was  once  told,"  says 
De  Q,uincey,  "  by  a  near  relative  of  mine,  that  having  in  her  child- 
hood fallen  into  a  river,  and  being  on  the  very  verge  of  death  but. 
for  the  critical  assistance  which  reached  her,  she  saw  in  a  moment 
her  whole  life,  in  its  minutest  incidents,  arrayed  before  her  simul- 
taneously as  in  a  mirror,  and  she  had  a  faculty  developed  as  sud- 
denly for  comprehending  the  whole  and  every  part.  This,  from 
some  opium  experiences  of  mine,  I  can  believe.  I  have  indeed 
seen  the  same  thing  asserted  twice  in  modern  books,  and  accom- 
panied by  a  remark  which  I  am  convinced  is  true,  viz.,  that  the 
dread  book  of  account  which  the  Scriptures  speak  of  is  in  fact  the 
mind  itself  of  each  individual.  Of  this  at  least  I  feel  assured,  that 
there  is  no  such  thing  as  forgetting  possible  to  the  mind.  A 
thousand  accidents  may  and  will  interpose  a  veil  between  our 
present  consciousness  and  the  secret  inscriptions  on  the  mind — 
accidents  of  the  same  sort  will  also  rend  away  the  veil ;  but  alike 
whether  veiled  or  unveiled  the  inscription  remains  forever,  just  as 
the  stars  seem  to  withdraw  befoue  the  common  light  of  day,  where- 
as, in  fact,  we  all  know  that  it  is  the  light  which  is  drawn  over  them 
as  a  veil,  and  that  they  are  waiting  to  be  revealed  when  the  obscur- 
ing day-light  shall  have  withdrawn."  And  since  nothing  is  for- 
gotten, it  seems  certain  that  at  the  day  of  judgment,  of  which  w<- 

26 


402  ON    THE    EVIL    EFFECTS    PROD-UCED 

have  been  speaking,  not  the  least  startling1  part  of  the  proceedings 
will  be  a  resurrection  of  long-buried  sins.  "A  God  in  anger  will 
be.  an  appalling  sight,  but  one  more  appalling  will  be  that  of  our  own 
heart."* 

All  of  us  who  have  experienced  anything  like  the, following 
may  comprehend  how  there  should  be  such  a  resurrection  of  feel- 
ing. Conceive  a  world-involved  man  taking  a  quiet  day  in  a  life 
of  engrossing  business  to  visit  the  scenes  of  his  childhood.  The 
house  in  which  he  dwelt — the  room  in  which  he  slept — the  field 
in  which  he  played — the  garden  or  glen  in  which  he  gathered 
flowers — this  gnarled  oak,  and  that  sequestered  dell — have  all  an 
interest  to  him  which  they  have  to  no  other :  and  their  interest 
arises  from  their  raising  recollections  of  scenes  which  seemed  to 
be  forever  lost,  but  which  were  vastly  interesting  at  the  time,  as 
they  are  still  interesting  in  the  gushing  memory  of  them  as  they 
well  up  from  the  mind  as  waters  from  a  fountain.  Events  which 
were  regarded  as  absolutely  buried  are  made  to  spring  up  in  vivid 
reality,  and  they  come  with  intense  power  to  move  the  soul  to 
mirth  or  melancholy.  It  is  an  experimental  proof  of  the  possi- 
bility of  the  resurrection  of  buried  thoughts.  So  far  as  forgotten 
sins  are  concerned,  the  conscience  is  the  archangel's  trumpet, 
whose  sound  raises  them  from  the  graves  to  which  they  had  been 
consigned,  in  the  hope  that  they  might  dwell  in  perpetual  dark- 
ness ;  and  they  stand  before  us  shivering  and  shaking,  calling  on 
the  hills  to  cover  them,  and  the  caves  to  hide  them — but  all  to  no 
purpose,  for  there  is  no  place  in  which  these  risen  ghosts  can  find 
a  shelter,  except  in  the  land  of  perpetual  darkness,  where  their 
misery  is  concealed,  though  not  lessened  or  remedied.  There 
is  a  death  for  the  soul,  but  there  is  no  grave  in  which  to  bury  it. 

But  will  the  mind  not  endeavor  still  to  conceal  the  guilt  from 
itself?  Most  assuredly  it  will,  but  in  a  new  way.  The  old  methods 
have  failed,  but  new  ones  will  present  themselves,  and  be  eagerly 
followed.  After  the  exposure  which  has  been  made,  it  knows  that 
it  cannot  conceal  itself  in  its  old  mantle.  It  must  therefore  get  a 
new  one,  which,  if  not  so  fair  and  becoming,  nor  adapted  for  con- 
cealment, may  yet  be  harder  and  more  impenetrable,  and  fitted  for 
defence  ;  and  underneath  the  external  garb,  when  it  is  torn  away, 
there  will  be  found  a  coat  of  mail  for  protection.  The  man  can- 
not now  flatter  himself  into  the  belief  that  his  virtues  are  numer- 
ous and  his  faults  few  ;  for,  as  he  stood  at  the  bar  of  the  judge,  he 

*  Bourdaloue. 


Bf  A  CONDEMNING  CONSCIENCE.  403 

got  a  view  of  his  character  in  all  its  blackness  and  hideousness. 
But  still  he  cannot  bear  the  continual  gnawings  of  that  condemn- 
ing conscience.  If  the  conscience  cannot  be  silenced,  may  he  not 
succeed  in  getting  beyond  the  reach  of  its  voice?  Or  he  may  allow 
other  feelings  to  hurry  him  along  till  the  sound  no  longer  falls 
upon  his  ear.  Such  feelings  will  rise  up  spontaneously  in  the 
mind  under  the  irritation  produced  by  the  condemning  sentence  of 
the  judge ;  and  if  these  feelings  of  rage  and  disappointment  can 
but  allow  the  mind  to  escape  the  conscience,  they  will  be  willingly 
followed.  Not  that  these  other  feelings  are  pleasant,  but  they  are 
at  least  of  a  more  moving  and  hurrying  description  than  those 
which  oppress  the  spirit,  as  the  conscience  utters  its  judgments, 
and  admits  of  no  appeal.  If  they  do  not  give  relief,  they  at  least 
furnish  a  change  of  misery,  as  the  man  racked  with  pain  on  all 
sides  will  yet  again  and  again  change  his  posture,  were  it  only  to 
vary  his  distress.  Tied,  like  Mazeppa,  on  a  courser  over  which  he 
has  no  control,  he  would  feel  a  kind  of  ecstasy  in  the  very  wild- 
ness  of  its  careering.  Not  only  so,  but  acquiring  courage  from 
despair,  he  may  proceed  the  length  of  making  war  with  the  judge. 
Since  he  cannot  flee  from  him,  he  will  perhaps  affect  to  contemn 
him,  or  impugn  the  authority  of  his  law, 

"  Souls  who  dare  look  the  omnipotent  tyrant  in 
His  everlasting  face,  and  tell  him  that 
His  evil  is  not  good?' — BYRON'S  CAIN 

But  this  is  by  no  means  so  easy  a  work,  for  meanwhile  God  has 
a  witness  in  every  man's  bosom.  There  must  be  some  way  of 
deluding  this  witness  before  so  bold  a  step  can  be  taken.  The 
spirit  will  now  try  to  make  the  conscience  condemn  the  judge  as 
being  harsh  and  relentless.  Strange  and  paradoxical  as  it  may 
appear,  it  will,  to  some  extent,  be  successful.  It  will  picture  to 
the  conscience  the  condemnation  as  a  dark  deed  pf  tyranny  and 
revenge  committed  by  God  ;  and  believing,  or  trying  to  believe, 
that  God  is  malignant,  it  will  view  Him  with  the  feelings  which 
malignity  should  inspire.  And  now  the  soul  will  not  only  be  angry 
with  God,  but  feel  as  if  it  did  right  to  be  angry,  and  the  war 
which  it  carries  on  will  not  only  be  that  of  the  passions,  but  of  an 
evil  conscience.  The  feelings  roused  will  be  a  strange  mixture  of 
heat  and  cold.  In  his  whole  state  he  will,  as  it  were,  be  travel- 
ling constantly  from  "  beds  of  raging  fire  to  starve  in  ice  ;"  and  in 
his  soul  there  will  be  such  extremes  as  Sir  James  Ross  saw  in 


404          ON  THE  EVIL  EFFECTS  PRODUCED 

those  lofty  mountains  near  the  South  Pole,  where  molten  lava, 
with  a  glaring  light,  constantly  poured  itself  on  eternal  snows, 
The  war,  too,  will  now  be  incessant.  If  the  war  were  merely 
that  of  the  passions,  there  might  be  cessations  and  gaps  and  inter- 
vals ;  but  being  now  that  of  a  troubled  conscience,  as  well  as  that 
of  a  disordered  heart,  it  becomes  a  constant  and  everlasting  war- 
fare without  respite  and  without  end. 

Such  seems  to  be  the  necessary  issue  of  the  very  principles  of 
the  nature  of  responsible  beings.  -It  is  conceivable,  then,  that 
there  may  be  beings,  angelic  beings,  who  wage  a  never-ceasing 
warfare  with  God,  urged  on  by  a  disordered  conscience,  and  pas- 
sions which  have  broken  loose  from  all  restraint.  Man's  reason 
and  experience  cannot  tell  him  that  there  are  such  beings,  but  they 
announce  that  there  may  be  such  beings,  and  that  such  is  the 
natural  and — unless  God  miraculously  interpose — the  necessary 
result  of  the  fall  of  beings  who  have  a  moral  law  in  their  hearts. 
Every  one  can  understand  how  a  criminal,  repeatedly  condemned 
and  punished  by  an  earthly  judge,  becomes  hardened  in  the  very 
process.  This  phenomenon,  constantly  presented  in  every  coun- 
try, is  the  natural  issue  of  principles  in  the  mind  of  fallen  man. 
But  these  same  principles,  on  the  condemnation  being  pronounced 
by  the  Judge  of  the  universe,  will  lead  to  a  similar  result ;  and 
just  as  we  find  that  those  who  have  once  been  elevated  become 
the  most  degraded  on  their  being  seduced  into  crime,  just  as  we 
find  the  most  abandoned  criminals  in  nations  that  are  refined,  so 
we  may  expect  that  beings  who  rank  the  highest  must  descend 
the  lowest  when  they  fall,  their  very  previous  exaltation  making 
them  roll  the  farther  down.  Revelation  is  not,  then,  telling  us  of 
an  impossibility  in  announcing  that  there  are  fallen  angels  ever 
incited  by  the  restlessness  within,  to  try  new  projects  of  wickedness 
were  it  only  to  vary  the  sameness  of  their  misery ;  to  extract  a 
bitter  consolation  from  the  thwarting  of  the  Divine  purposes  and 
the  extension  of  vice  and  misery,  and  to  drag  down  others  with 
them  into  that  abyss  into  which  they  have  been  plunged.  He 
who  fell  from  pride  may  surely  now  be  expected  to  gratify  an  un- 
ruly ambition,  by  attempting  to  multiply  the  restless  spirits  who 
may  do  him  homage.  True  it  is  that  every  apparent  victory  has 
been  followed  by  overwhelming  defeat ;  but  the  apparent  triumph 
has  been  sufficient  to  goad  on  that  spirit  which  has  nothing  to 
hope  from  assumed  and  forced  submission,  while  it  is  indisposed 
to  genuine  repentance.  And  we  have  only  to  look  to  man  to  dis- 


BY    A    CONDEMNING    CONSCIENCE.  405 

cover  that  propensities  to  evil  rush  on  towards  their  objects,  re- 
gardless of  consequences,  and  in  contempt  of  all  experience.  It 
seems  as  if  the  moral  being  who  falls  must  fall  forever,  and  his 
descent  be  a  rapidly  accelerated  one,  and  the  termination  to  be 
found  only  at  the  bottom  of  a  pit  that  is  bottomless. 

Man  has  only  to  look  within  to  discover  principles  which  might 
bring  the  possessor  into  a  state  similar  to  that  of  fallen  angels. 
"  But  for  the  grace  of  God,  there  goes  John  Bradford,"  was  the 
exclamation  (often  quoted)  of  a  well-known  reformer,  as  he  saw  a 
criminal  led  away  to  execution.  If  man  will  only  look  into  his 
own  heart  in  a  searching  manner,  he  may  discover  principles 
which,  in  some  of  their  possible  operations,  are  capable  of  sinking 
him,  even  into  the  depths  of  demoniacal  wickedness.  He  who 
knows  his  own  nature  will  be  prepared  to  acknowledge  that  the 
contests  of  which  poets  have  sung  between  the  spirits  of  evil  and 
God,  are  at  least  possible.  Nay,  it  may  be  doubted  whether  such 
poets  as  Milton  and  Byron  could  have  given  such  a  painfully 
graphic  anatomy  of  demoniacal  pride  and  passion,  had  they  not 
drawn  from  their  own  nature;  or  whether  we  should  have  been 
so  moved  by  the  description,  if  there  had  been  nothing  responsive 
in  our  own  bosom. 

"  Thou  speak'st  to  me  of  things  which  long  have  swam 
In  visions  through  my  thought." — BYRON'S  CAIN. 

Combining  these  considerations,  which  have  a  foundation  in  the 
principles  of  our  fallen  nature,  it  is  difficult  to  see  how,  if  God  does 
not  interpose,  man  can  stop  short  of  the  demoniacal  state.  There 
are  persons  who  wonder  that  man  should  be  consigned  to  the 
place  prepared  for  the  devil  and  his  angels  ;  but  when  he  has  ac- 
quired the  character  of  the  devil  and  his  angels,  in  what  place  can 
he  so  appropriately  be  ? 

There  is  one  other  tendency  of  falling  humanity  to  which  it  is 
needful  to  attend.  We  would  call  it  the  drying  up  of  the  natural 
affections,  according  as  wickedness  increases,  and  the  heart  be- 
comes rebellious. 

We  have  already  contemplated  one  striking  manifestation  of 
this  tendency,  in  the  natural  feeling  being  restrained  from  flowing 
towards  God,  from  the  very  instant  that  sin  was  committed.  It  is 
evidently  an  authentic  statement  that  is  given  of  the  conduct  of 
our  first  parents,  when  they  are  represented,  after  their  first  act  of 
ein,  as  avoiding  the  presence  of  God,  They  did  not  flee  from  one 


406  ON    THE    EVIL    EFFECTS    PRODUCE!* 

another ;  they  had  still  some  love  one  to  another ;  but  they  now 
felt  the  presence  of  God  repulsive,  and  they  had  already  ceased  to 
love  him.  We  see  that  a  guilty  conscience  is  capable  of  drying 
up  a  stream  of  affection  ;  it  has  dried  up  the  stream  of  love  that 
flowed  towards  God.  In  the  affection  which  man  lavishes,  God 
is  the  exception  ;  it  would  seem  as  if  he  could  love  everything  ex- 
cept his  Maker. 

At  least  he  seems  capable  of  doing  so  in  the  earlier  stages  of 
his  career.  But  the  same  guilty  conscience  that  has  dried  up  one 
stream,  can  dry  up  others.  Hence  the  prejudices  against  certain 
individuals — the  envy,  the  malice,  the  revenge  that  are  to  be  found 
in  the  world — these  are  not  original  parts  of  man's  constitution, 
but  acquisitions  made,  to  some  extent  at  least,  by  a  guilty  con- 
science, and  to  the  full  extent  by  the  conscience  neglecting  to  ex- 
ercise its  legitimate  control. 

There  seems  to  be  an  impression  among  not  a  few,  that  if  the 
conscience  were  the  supreme  regulator  of  human  conduct,  it  would 
so  far  give  the  character  a  stern  and  forbidding  aspect,  by  prevent- 
ing the  flow  of  human  affection.  But  these  parties  have  altogether 
mistaken  the  nature  of  man.  It  is  one  of  the  highest  offices  of 
the  conscience,  in  guiding  all  the  principles  of  the  mind,  to  guide 
in  an  especial  manner  the  affections,  and  cause  them  to  flow  out 
in  proper  measure  in  their  proper  channels.  The  instant  effect  of 
a  deranged  conscience  is  the  drying  up  of  one  of  the  streams, 
that  which  should  flow  towards  God ;  and  the  drying  up  of  other 
streams  follows  in  the  progress  of  wickedness.  In  the  deranged 
nature  of  man  the  fountains  of  the  affections,  which  should  have 
been  kept  pure  and  fresh,  are  first  allowed  to  be  partially  choked 
up  and  polluted,  then  the  waters  flow  in  perverted  channels,  and 
are  finally  lost  altogether. 

In  this  downward  career,  there  is  no  change  of  the  fundamental 
principles  and  constituents  of  man's  nature ;  yet  there  are  sad 
changes  of  personal  character.  There  are  numberless  analogies 
in  human  life  to  show,  that  there  may  be  a  change  of  the  train 
of  feelings  in  the  mind,  with  no  change  in  the  original  faculties. 
Look  first  at  this  sprightly  girl,  then  at  this  sober  matron,  and  then 
at,  this  forlorn  widow — it  is  the  same  person  throughout ;  but  how 
different  the  individual  thoughts  and  emotions  at  these  different 
times.  Compare  her  at  this  present  moment  grieving  over  the  re- 
cent loss  of  her  earthly  partner,  with  what  she  was  but  a  few 
weeks  ago.  Follow  that  widow  into  the  work  in  which  she  is  now 


BY    A    CONDEMNING    CONSCIENCE.  407 

called  to  engage,  and  mark  the  new  energies  called  forth  by  the 
unexpected  situations  in  which  she  is  placed.  This  widow  in  these 
new  scenes  is  the  same  as  she  was  five  years  ago  as  the  wife,  or 
as  she  was  twenty  years  ago  as  the  lively  girl, — yet  how  different 
the  train  of  thought  and  feeling.  Now,  we  urge  this  as  a  mere 
illustration  of  an  interesting  psychological  phenomenon,  and  as 
preparing  us  to  believe,  that  in  the  downward  progress  of  wicked- 
ness there  may  be  fearful  changes,  and  they  must  be  changes  to 
the  worse,  in  human  character. 

In  particular,  we  may  anticipate  a  drying  up  of  natural  affec- 
tion. The  raven  that  brought  intelligence  to  Apollo  was  white 
till  it  brought  the  sad  news  of  the  death  of  a  favorite,  when  its 
color  instantly  became  black.  Almost  as  great,  almost  as  sudden 
is  the  change  of  feeling  with  which  men  view  certain  objects  after 
a  change  of  circumstances.  In  the  vernal  days  of  youth  and 
prosperity,  the  affections  flow  and  sparkle  on  all  sides,  and  water 
and  refresh  every  object  near  them.  But  as  years  roll  on  they  are 
more  sparing  and  restricted  in  their  current.  Competition,  clashing 
interests  and  selfishness  begin  to  produce  an  apathy  ;  or  the  malign 
passions  breaking  out,  produce  a  positive  hatred  and  antipathy. 
These  are  the  lessons  commonly  learned  by  human  nature  in  the 
school  of  the  world,  where  selfishness  in  one  leads  to  selfishness 
in  another,  and  malignity  in  one  party  leads  to  malignity  in  the 
opposite  party. 

But  we  are  now  to  contemplate  the  effects  produced  on  the  af- 
fections, not  by  the  world,  but  by  that  judgment  which  we  have 
supposed  God  to  institute,  and  issuing  in  the  positive  and  open  re- 
bellion of  man.  It  is  difficult  to  see  how  any  affection,  except  of 
the  most  perverted  kind,  can  outlive  such  a  scorching  of  the  soul. 
We  doubt  much  if  a  soul  so  maddened  by  the  conscience  can  ever 
afterwards  look  upon  any  object  with  kindness  and  complacency. 
There  is  more  than  a  freezing  of  the  affection,  such  as  may  be 
produced  by  the  cold  atmosphere  of  the  world;  for  if  there  was 
nothing  but  a  freezing,  the  affection  might  again  melt  and  flow  in 
a  more  genial  clime.  But  this  awful  judgment,  like  the  Medusa's 
head,  has  turned  it  into  hard  and  enduring  stone.  The  amazon. 
in  her  warlike  pursuits,  had  her  breast  dried  up  thafr  she  might 
fight  the  more  fiercely ;  and  there  is,  we  suspect,  such  a  drying 
up  of  the  breasts  of  human  affection  in  the  indulgence  of  the 
fierce  feelings  called  up  by  a  condemning  conscience; 


408  GENERAL    REVIEW    OF 


SECTION  IX.— GENERAL  REVIEW  OF  MAN'S  EXISTING  MORAL 

NATURE. 

In  the  researches  prosecuted  in  this  chapter,  we  have  had  little 
assistance  afforded,  at  least  directly,  by  other  inquirers  into  human 
nature.*  Metaphysical  philosophers  and  ethical  writers  have  com- 
monly contented  themselves  with  investigating  the  original  moral 
constitution  of  man's  mind,  and  developing  the  office  of  the  moral 
faculty  ;  but  they  have  instituted  no  particular  inquiry  into,  nor 
given  any  explanation  of  its  existing  state.  On  the  other  hand, 
we  find  in  the  writings  of  divines  many  statements  and  specula- 
tions as  to  the  present  state  of  man's  heart ;  but  then  there  is  no 
inquiry  into  the  original  and  indestructible  structure  of  man's 
moral  nature.  Every  thinking  mind  has  felt  as  if  there  was  a 
gap  to  fill  up  between  such  writers  as  Hutcheson,  Reid,  Stewart, 
Brown,  Mackintosh,  Kant,  Cousin,  and  Jouffroy,  on  the  one  hand  ; 
and  the  common  treatises  of  divinity,  such  as  those  of  Augustine, 
Calvin,  Owen,  and  Edwards,  on  the  other.  This  discrepancy  was 
clearly  perceived  by  the  acute  and  accomplished  mind  of  Dr.  Ward- 
law  ;  and  in  his  Christian  Ethics  lie  has  endeavored  to  construct  a 
system  at  once  philosophical  and  scriptural.  It  may  be  doubted, 
however,  whether  his  success  has  been  complete,  and  whether  he 
has  not  been  led  most  unnecessarily  to  reject  the  truth  which  has 
been  established  by  the  philosophers,  and  to  deny  to  the  conscience 
the  authority  which  God  has  given  it.  The  attempt  now  made 
to  reconcile  things  which  have  been  felt  to  be  contradictory,  but 
which  we  believe  to  be  quite  consistent  in  themselves,  is  at  least 
different  from  the  course  prosecuted  by  the  excellent  divine,  who 
has  so  adorned  by  his  character  and  writings  the  religion  which 
he  professes. 

We  have  not  felt  ourselves  called  on  to  dispute  the  general  ac- 
curacy of  the  investigations  of  ethical  writers,  who  have  given  a 
high  place  to  the  moral  sense,  and  who  have  sought  to  exalt 
man's  moral  nature.  Acknowledging  the  great  and  important 
truths  which  they  have  established,  and  proceeding  upon  them, 
we  have  sought  to  give  them  a  farther  extension  and  application. 
There  are  parts  of  the  writings  of  all  the  philosophers  referred  to, 
in  which  they  admit  that  the  conscience  has  not  in  fact  the  con- 
trol which  it  ought  to  have  ;  but  they  speedily  lose  sight  of  their 

*  There  are  important  principles,  however,  laid  down  in  several  of  the  discourses 
«f  Chalmers  and  Vinet. 


MAN'S    EXISTING    MORAL    NATURE.  409 

own  admission,  or  at  least  attempt  no  explanation  of  a  phenome- 
non which,  to  say  the  least  of  it,  is  as  worthy  of  being  investi- 
gated as  the  original  functions  of  the  conscience.  We  have  as 
certain  evidence  that  the  conscience  convicts  every  given  man 
of  sin,  as  we  have  of  the  very  existence  of  the  conscience  itself. 
It  is  upon  the  very  doctrine  that  the  philosophers  have  established, 
that  we  have  sought  to  rear  the  other  doctrine  which  they  are  so 
averse  to  look  at.  Adopting  the  principles  which  philosophers 
have  furnished,  we  have  carried  these  principles  into  fields  which 
they  were  afraid  to  enter;  and  in  doing  so,  we  have  arrived  at 
the  same  conclusions  in  regard  to  the  corruption  of  man's  nature, 
as  those  divines  who  have  derived  their  views  from  the  volume 
of  inspiration. 

While  the  view  presented  of  human  nature  has  been  suffi- 
ciently dark  and  melancholy,  it  has  at  the  same  time  been  dis- 
criminating, which  the  doctrine  set  forth  by  divines  has  not 
always  been.  In  maintaining  the  total  depravity  of  man's  na- 
ture, they  have  been  afraid  to  make  the  least  admission  as  to  the 
qualities  and  features  of  man's  character,  which  are  undoubtedly 
pleasing  and  praiseworthy  in  themselves ;  and  they  take  great 
pains  to  explain  away  those  numerous  passages  of  God's  word 
which  "  accord  to  human  virtues  those  praises  which  could  not 
be  accorded  to  them  in  a  system  which  denies  all  moral  value 
in  the  actions  of  men."*  In  particular,  we  have  seen,  first,  that  the 
conscience  retains  in  the  human  mind  its  original  claims  of  au- 
thority. The  law  is  broken,  but  it  is  still  binding.  Then,  sec- 
ondly, there  is  room  in  the  depraved  heart  of  man  for  the  play 
and  exercise  of  all  the  high  talents  and  susceptibilities  with  which 
man  was  originally  furnished.  Thirdly,  there  is  yet  in  the  hu- 
man mind  many  amiable  and  benevolent  qualities.  Fourthly, 
there  are  actions  of  moral  honesty  and  integrity,  and  even  of 
religion  so  called,  performed  in  obedience  to  the  conscience. 

But  over  against  these  truths,  we  have  to  place  an  equal  num- 
ber of  others.  As,  first,  while  the  conscience  asserts  its  claims, 
these  claims  are  not  attended  to.  Secondly,  the  powers  and  sen- 
sibilities of  the  mind  are  abused  and  perverted.  Thirdly,  the  af- 
fections are  not  under  the  control  of  right  principle,  and  in  par- 
ticular are  not  directed  to  .God  as  they  ought  to  be.  Fourthly,  the 
actions,  whether  of  morality  or  religion,  performed  in  obedience  to 
the  conscience,  are  performed  in  obedience  to  a  perverted  con- 

*  Vinet. 


410  GENERAL    REVIEW    OF 

science;  and  so  there  is  something  defective  in  these  actions 
themselves,  while  the  general  state  of  the  agent  being  depraved, 
we  cannot  approve  of  the  agent  in  the  acts. 

It  is  of  the  utmost  moment  that  the  doctrine  now  expounded  be 
distinguished  from  the  miserably  low  and  grovelling  views  of  those 
who  would  represent  all  and  each  of  mankind  as  utterly  selfish 
and  dishonest.  This  is  an  opinion,  learned  not  in  the  school  of 
religion,  but  in  the  school  of  the  world.  It  prevails  among  the 
low-minded  and  the  suspicious,  and  in  all  ages  and  states  of  so- 
ciety in  which  men's  sentiments  have  been  debauched  by  reigning 
profligacy,  (the  most  selfish  of  all  the  vices,  though  it  may  seem 
the  most  generous,)  or  utterly  prostrated  and  perverted  by  the 
disappointment  which  has  succeeded  a  period  of  great  public  pro- 
fession of  generosity  which  has  turned  out  to  be  hypocritical. 
Men  judge  of  others  by  themselves  ;  and  the  selfish  cannot  be 
brought  to  believe  in  the  existence  of  disinterestedness.  Those 
who  have  made  it  their  business  to  corrupt  their  species,  and  those 
who  habitually  mingle  with  the  abandoned,  have  generally  rea- 
soned themselves  out  of  all  belief  in  human  virtue.  Persons  once 
cheated  are  afraid  of  deceit  all  their  lives  after ;  and  when  nations 
have  come  to  see  the  hollowness  of  the  professions  of  patriotism, 
which  those  who  wish  to  lead  them  have  made,  they  are  apt  to 
conclude  in  their  haste  that  all  men  are  deceivers.  The  knave, 
the  profligate,  the  selfish,  the  politician  who  has  been  in  the  way 
of  corrupting  men's  principles,  and  those  communities  in  which 
there  is  only  reigning  vice,  or  whose  best  hopes  have  been  disap- 
pointed, all  conclude  that  every  man  is  bent  only  on  promoting 
his  own  interests,  and  is  ready  to  overreach  and  deceive  his 
neighbor. 

Now,  we  are  most  anxious  that  it  should  be  observed,  that  the 
view  which  we  have  presented  of  human  nature  encourages  no 
such  dark  and  suspicious  sentiments.  It  does  not  lead  every  man 
to  suspect  his  neighbor ;  it  rather  leads  every  man  to  be  jealous 
of  himself.  No  two  classes  of  maxims  can  be  more  opposed  than 
those  of  such  writers  as  Rochefoucault  and  Helvetius,  who  exhibit 
human  selfishness  in  unrelieved  colors,  that  we  may  be  brought 
to  distrust  all  men  ;  and  those  of  good  men  who  love  the  human 
race,  even  when  they  mourn  over  its  sad  degeneracy.  We  ac- 
knowledge, that  in  perfect  consistency  with  the  views  above  de- 
veloped, there  may  be  among  mankind  much  real  hospitality, 
kindness,  and  sympathy  with  distress,  much  sincere  friendship, 


MAN'S    EXISTING    MORAL    NATURE.  411 

noble  patriotism,  and  large-hearted  philanthropy — that  there  may 
be  the  heart  to  feel  and  the  hand  to  help,  the  spirit  to  purpose, 
and  the  courage  to  execute  deeds  of  patience  and  the  highest 
heroism. 

We  are  most  anxious,  too,  that  the  views  expounded  should  be 
distinguished  from  those  of  the  Utilitarian  school  of  philosophy  in 
this  country,  and  what  has  been  called  the  Sensational  school  in 
France,  and  all  who  tell  us  that  every  man  is  mainly  governed 
by  a  regard  to  his  own  interest.  Truly  there  are  some  who 
would  degrade  human  nature  lower  than  it  is,  on  the  pretence  of 
exalting  it.  Fallen  though  mankind  be,  they  are  capable  of  en- 
tertaining and  cherishing  many  kindly  feelings  and  benevolent 
affections,  and  they  are  fully  as  often  swayed  by  impulse,  caprice, 
lust,  and  passion,  as  by  a  systematic  selfishness. 

We  utterly  abhor  such  a  sentiment  as  that  on  which  a  writer 
would  found  a  whole  theory  of  jurisprudence,  namely,  that  every 
man  pursues  his  own  interest  when  he  knows  it.  We  may  agree 
with  Rochefoucault  when  he  says,  "  That  which  we  take  for 
virtue  is  often  nothing  but  an  assemblage  of  divers  actions,  and  of 
divers  interests,  which  fortune  or  our  own  industry  knows  how  to 
arrange."  "  We  are  so  prepossessed  in  a  way  in  our  own  favor, 
that  what  we  take  for  virtues  is  often  nothing  but  a  number  of  vices 
which  have  met  together,  and  which  pride  and  self-love  have  dis- 
guised." But  when  the  same  author  lets  us  know  elsewhere  that 
he  resolves  so-called  human  virtues  into  the  lowest  and  most  grov- 
elling vices,  we  draw  back  from  his  maxims  with  detestation. 
"Virtue  would  not  go  far  if  vanity  did  not  keep  it  company." 
"That  which  appears  generosity  is  often  nothing  but  ambition  in 
disguise,  despising  small  interests  in  order  to  attain  greater."* 
That  there  is  some  justice  in  these  maxims  cannot  be  denied,  but 
we  deplore  that  they  should  be  used  for  the  purpose  of  furthering 
so  low  an  object,  and  leaving  so  dangerous  an  impression.  The 
man  who  believes  his  whole  species  to  be  villains  is  sure  to  end 
by  himself  becoming  one,  if  indeed  he  has  not  begun  by  judg- 
ing others  by  himself.  "I said  in  my  haste  that  all  men  are  liars." 
The  man  who  says  so,  not  in  haste,  but  in  his  calm  and  reflecting 
moments,  is,  we  suspect,  all  that  he  makes  others  to  be.  All  per- 
sons who,  like  Walpole  and  Bonaparte,  lay  it  down  as  a  principle 
that  every  man  has  a  price  and  may  be  corrupted,  may  be  judged 
by  their  own  standard.  Nor  can  we  find  language  strong  enough 
*  Maxims,  1,  207,  240, 301. 


412  GENERAL    REVIEW    OF 

to  condemn  that  miserable  so-called  philosophy  which  tells  us 
that  "a  physical  sensibility  has  produced  in  us  a  love  of  pleasure 
and  hatred  of  pain;  that  pleasure  and  pain  have  at  length  pro- 
duced and  opened  in  all  hearts  the  buds  of  self-love,  which,  by 
unfolding  themselves,  give  birth  to  the  passions  whence  spring  all 
our  virtues  and  vices."*  It  is  true  that  we  must  divide  off,  from 
our  catalogue  of  human  virtues,  many  actions  which  appear  vir- 
tuous, but  which  proceed  from  nothing  but  pride,  vanity,  ambition, 
and  a  disguised  selfishness.  But  after  having  made  full  allow- 
ance for  such,  there  still  remains  a  large  body  of  actions,  which 
we  must  refer  to  amiable  and  generous  feelings,  without  one  grain 
of  baser  alloy  mingling  with  them. 

There  are  deeper  mysteries  in  man's  spiritual  nature  than  some 
superficial  thinkers  ever  dream  of.  Their  "  inept  and  unscientific 
gunnery  does  not  include  in  its  calculations  the  parabolic  curve  of 
man's  spiritual  nature."t  Except  by  taking  into  our  calculation 
a  conscience,  and  an  evil  conscience,  we  cannot  comprehend  hu- 
man nature  or  human  action.  Those  who  have  left  this  impor- 
tant part  of  man's  existing  character  and  nature  out  of  account 
have  failed  to  give  any  rational  account  of  his  conduct,  more  par- 
ticularly in  reference  to  religion  ;  and  as  they  feel  their  incom- 
petency,  they  have  burst  out  into  empty  declamations  against  su- 
perstition and  fanaticism,  and  have  lost  their  own  temper  in 
ridiculing  human  infirmity.  We  cannot  explain  human  folly 
under  certain  of  its  modifications — we  cannot  explain  human 
folly  even  by  human  passion — we  cannot  understand  the  par- 
ticular mode  and  intensity  of  human  wickedness — we  are  puz- 
zled at  every  step,  till  we  call  in  a  perverted  moral  sense.  It  is 
by  the  help  of  this,  the  most  singular  part  of  man's  nature,  that 
we  are  enabled  to  account  for  all  other  singularities  and  anoma- 
lies of  his  spiritual  constitution. 

Man's  fallen,  like  his  original,  nature  is  a  deep  and  complex 
one.  There  are  other  sins  and  passions  besides  those  low  and 
base  ones  into  which  vulgar  minds  would  resolve  every  principle 
of  man's  heart.  Some  can  discover  nothing  in  man's  actuating 
motives  but  the  love  of  money,  others  nothing  but  the  love  of 
praise,  and  a  third  class,  apparently  more  profound,  resolve  all 
into  a  refined  and  far-sighted  self-love.  These  narrow  views  of 
narrow  minds  and  suspicious  hearts  are  utterly  inadequate  to  ex- 

*  Helvetius  on  the  Mind. 

f  Miller's  First  Impressions  of  England  an»-  the  English. 


MAN'S    EXISTING    MORAL    NATURE.  413 

plain  the  mysteries  of  the  human  soul.  The  lusts  and  pleasures 
of  the  human  heart  are  very  divers  and  very  numerous,  and 
assume  a  variety  of  forms.  There  maybe  much  sinfulness  where 
there  is  no  selfishness.  The  very  attempts  which  these  men  make 
to  find  such  low  motives  for  human  action  indicate  how  inade- 
quate are  their  views  of  the  true  nature  of  virtue  ;  for  these  par- 
ties as  much  as  say,  that  if  they  could  get  real  kindness  and 
amiability  in  the  world  they  would  be  completely  satisfied,  though 
there  were  no  godliness  and  no  moral  principle. 

We  include  all  men  under  sin,  not  by  seeking  to  debase  the 
human  character  lower  than  it  is,  but  by  exalting  the  standard 
of  virtue — not  higher  than  it  ought  to  be — but  by  making  it  such 
as  God  hath  ordained  it  in  our  very  constitution.  All  is  not 
virtue  which  is  free  from  the  taint  of  selfishness  and  passion  in 
their  vulgar  forms.  There  may  be  not  a  little  sin  in  weak  amia- 
bility, in  ill-regulated  affection,  and  a  perverted  conscience. 

Not  only  are  these  two  views,  which  we  may  call  the  selfish 
and  the  evangelical,  different  in  themselves,  they  are  different  also 
in  their  practical  influence.  The  tendency  of  the  one  is  to  render 
each  man  satisfied  with  himself,  and  suspicious  of  those  with 
whom  he  comes  in  contact.  The  tendency  of  the  other  is  to  hum- 
ble every  man  in  his  own  estimation,  and  prompt  him  to  use  all 
available  means  to, elevate  a  race  which  has  sunk  to  such  a  depth 
of  degradation.  The  man  who  habitually  looks  upon  his  fellows 
in  the  former  of  these  lights  is  apt  to  become  hard-hearted, 
cunning,  selfish,  and  grovelling.  Believing  mankind  to  be  de- 
ceivers, he  treats  them  as  deceivers,  and  becomes  himself  a  de- 
ceiver in  doing  so.  Imagining  himself  to  be  surrounded  by  per- 
sons whose  ruling  principle  is  selfishness,  and  whose  mean  of 
furthering  their  end  is  deceit,  he  feels,  in  dealing  with  them,  as  if 
he  were  constrained  to  descend  to  their  level,  and  fight  them  with 
their  own  weapons.  On  the  other  hand,  the  person  who  views 
the  race  as  ungodly,  but  who  regards  himself  as  tainted  with  the 
same  evil,  will  be  so  awed  by  a  sense  of  his  own  sinfulness,  as  to 
be  incapable  of  judging  harshly  of  others,,  and  the  worst  feelings 
with  which  he  regards  the  race  will  be  those  of  sorrow  and  com- 
miseration. 

We  are  not  then  at  liberty  to  look  upon  man  with  a  contempt- 
uous, scornful  feeling  of  mind,  such  as  that  which  we  feel  in  look- 
ing at  a  loathsome  reptile.  We  may  denounce  man  ;  but  we  can 
never  despise  him.  We  may  blame,  but  we  dare  not  contemn 


414  GENERAL    REVIEW   OP    MAN5S    MORAL    NATURE. 

§ 

him,  lest,  in  doing  so,  we  be  contemning  the  noblest  part  of  the 
workmanship  of  God  in  this  lower  world.  There  may  be  indig- 
nation, pity,  or  horror,  but  mingled  with  these  there  must  be 
feelings  of  honor,  respect,  and  reverence  towards  the  essential 
parts  and  principles  of  a  creature  formed  in  the  very  image  of 
God. 

Nor  will  these  views  induce  us  to  retire  from  the  world  in  dis- 
gust, or  make  us  feel  a  less  interest  in  the  race.  The  truths  on 
which  our  mind  is  made  to  dwell  will  rather  tend  to  quicken  and 
animate  our  love,  and  cause  it  to  flow  out  in  a  deeper  and  stronger 
current.  When  is  it  that  we  think  most  of  an  earthly  friend,  and 
are  most  deeply  interested  in  his  welfare?  Is  it  when  he  is  known 
to  be  in  safety,  dwelling  in  security  in  the  bosom  of  his  family,  far 
from  violence,  or  disease,  or  accident?  or  rather  is  it  not  when  he  is 
thought  to  be  in  danger,  as  when  he  is  on  the  midnight  journey, 
in  paths  which  robbers  infest,  or  crossed  by  deep  and  rapid  rivers, 
sweeping  many  an  unguarded  traveller  from  this  world  to  the  next? 
When  is  it  that  the  wife  thinks  most  of  the  husband,  and  the  sis- 
ter feels  the  deepest  interest  in  the  brother?  Is  it  not  when  the 
party  loved  is  laid  on  a  bed  of  distress,  or  fighting  with  the  billows 
of  death?  A  love  is  then  kindled  which  never  burned  before,  and 
tears  flow  from  eyes,  the  very  fountains  of  which  seemed  to  have 
been  dried  up  by  the  scorching  power  of  this  world's  anxieties.  It 
is  the  very  circumstance  that  the  race  is  lost  which  awakens  so 
deep  a  feeling  in  the  breast  of  the  Christian,  a  feeling  accom- 
panied with  the  thought  that  what  is  thus  lost  is  precious  above 
all  price  which  can  be  set  upon  it,  and  that  the  recovery  of  it  is 
worth  any  amount  of  labor  or  sacrifice  which  we  can  possibly 
render. 


CHAPTER  III. 

OTHER  GOVERNING  PRINCIPLES  OF  THE  HUMAN  MIND. 

SECTION  I— GOVERNING  PRINCIPLES  NEITHER  VIRTUOUS  NOR 
VICIOUS.    THE  APPETITES  AND  INSTINCTIVE  DESIRES. 

THERE  are  certain  governing  principles  planted  in  the  human 
mind  by  God,  the  exercise  of  which  is  neither  virtuous  nor  vicious. 
Now,  it  is  a  remarkable  circumstance  that  all  of  these  are  excel- 
lent in  themselves,  and  in  admirable  adjustment  to  the  state  in 
which  the  author  of  our  being  has  placed  us.  Anterior  to  the 
abuse  which  may  be  made  of  them,  they  are  of  the  most  benefi- 
cent nature,  and  eminently  fitted  to  promote  the  welfare  of  the 
individual,  and  of  society  at  large.  The  mere  possession  of  these 
principles,  however,  does  not  constitute  any  one  virtuous.  It 
proves  merely  the  wisdom  and  benevolence  of  him  who  hath 
planted  them  in  our  natures.  The  virtue  or  vice  of  mankind  lies 
in  the  use  made  of  these  principles.  So  far  as  we  establish  their 
beneficence,  we  establish  not  the  moral  excellence  of  man,  but  the 
benevolence  of  God. 

In  now  proceeding  to  consider  some  of  these  principles  of  action, 
we  shall  not  be  at  pains  to  make  a  very  nice  or  subtle  analysis  of 
them.  It  is  possible  that  a  refined  metaphysics  might  resolve 
some  of  those  about  to  be  enunciated  into  simpler  principles  ;  we 
look  at  them  in  the  obvious  forms  which  they  assume  in  the  ordi- 
nary operations  of  the  mind.  It  is  of  little  consequence  to  the  ob- 
ject in  view  whether  they  be  original  principles,  or  the  natural  and 
necessary  result  of  such  original  principles.  It  is  enough  that  the 
principle  is  found  in  the  human  mind  naturally  and  intuitively, 
and  anterior  to  any  exercise  of  the  human  will  producing  it. 

I.  There  are  the  appetites. 

"  This  class  of  our  active  principles,"  says  Dugald  Stewart,  "  is 
distinguished  by  the  following  circumstances : — (1.)  They  take 
their  rise  from  the  body,  and  are  common  to  us  with  the  brutes. 
(2.)  They  are  not  constant,  but  occasional.  (3.)  They  are  ao- 


416  GOVERNING    PRINCIPLES 

companied  with  an  uneasy  sensation,  which  is  strong  or  weak  in 
proportion  to  the  strength  or  weakness  of  the  appetite.  Our  ap- 
petites are  three  in  number — hunger,  thirst,  and  the  appetite  of 
sex.  Of  these,  two  were  intended  for  the  preservation  of  the  in- 
dividual, the  third  for  the  continuance  of  the  species  ;  and  with- 
out them,  reason  would  have  been  insufficient  for  these  important 
purposes."  He  adds,  "  our  occasional  propensities  to  action  and 
repose  are  in  many  respects  analogous  to  our  appetites." 

Had  it  been  our  object  to  point- out  instances  of  design  in  the 
works  of  God,  these  appetites,  connecting  as  they  do  the  bodily 
frame,  on  the  one  hand  with  external  physical  nature,  and  on  the 
other  hand  with  the  mind  within,  might  have  supplied  many  in- 
structive examples.  Regarding  them  merely  as  materials  of  gov- 
ernment, they  do  still  exhibit  some  traces  of  design  to  the  reflect- 
ing mind.  We  see  how  wise  and  efficient  the  provision  made  for 
the  preservation  of  the  race.  We  see  how  man  is  compelled  to 
be  industrious  and  laborious,  in  order  to  obtain  the  food  needful 
for  the  gratification  of  these  appetites  ;  and  how  they  render  him 
active  on  the  one  hand  and  dependent  on  the  other.  Without 
these  appetites  he  would  have  been  sluggish  and  inactive  ;  or, 
impelled  by  the  propensities  merely  mental,  he  would  have  been 
rash  in  his  speculations,  and  imprudent  in  his  actions.  These 
appetites  are  one  main  instrument  in  the  hand  of  God  for  giving 
steadfastness  to  his  government,  and  in  making  man  fulfil  the 
purposes  which  he  has  to  execute  upon  the  earth. 

II.  There  are  the  mental  regulating  principles. 

(1.)  The  love  of  knowledge.  This  principle,  in  the  form  of 
curiosity,  appears  in  children  in  early  life,  and  in  the  most  savage 
and  primitive  states  of  society.  The  unknown,  the  hidden,  have 
most  powerful  attractions  to  the  inquisitive  spirit  of  man.  The 
curious  prying  into  a  neighbor's  character,  and  the  love  of  news, 
so  common  in  villages  and  rural  districts,  show  that  this  principle 
is  found  in  the  lowest  grades  of  society.  As  the  mind  is  ex- 
panded, so  is  this  desire  elevated  ;  and  it  becomes  the  love  of 
travelling,  the  love  of  history,  the  love  of  reading,  and  the  love  of 
science.  The  traveller  encountering  the  most  eminent  perils  in 
the  burning  sands  of  Africa,  or  the  icy  regions  of  the  poles,  and 
the  scholar  wasting  his  strength  over  the  midnight  lamp,  testify 
how  intense  this  desire  may  become  in  individual  minds. 

The  more  we  reflect,  the  more  must  we  be  impressed  with  the 
extent  of  the  influence  exercised  by  this  principle  upon  mankind 


NEITHER    VIRTUOUS    NOR    VICIOUS.  417 

at  large.  It  is  a  great  incentive  to  activity  among  individual 
minds,  and  it  helps  on  the  improvement  of  society.  It  brings  the 
corners  of  the  earth  together,  and  the  most  distant  periods  of  the 
past  are  made  to  hand  down  instruction  to  the  present.  It  brings 
human  character  under  inspection,  and  therefore  under  the  control 
of  public  opinion,  and  thus  lays  great  restraints  upon  human 
wickedness.  Take  away  the  thirst  for  knowledge  from  the  race, 
and  you  sink  them  beneath  the  savage  state,  and  with  no  reason- 
able hope  of  ever  elevating  them. 

(2.)  The  desire  of  esteem.  It  is  a.  principle  of  all  but  universal 
operation.  "  We  observe,  even  among  the  vulgar,  how  fond  they 
are  to  have  an  inscription  over  their  grave."*  Some,  it  is  true, 
have,  in  their  career  of  vice  fallen  beneath  it,  but  few  have  risen 
above  it.  Some  court  the  good  opinion  of  the  masses,  and  others 
of  the  select  few.  One  man  looks  down  with  contempt  upon  the 
approbation  of  the  poor,  the  illiterate,  and  the  vulgar ;  but  it  is 
because  he  wishes  to  stand  high  in  the  favour  of  the  rich,  the 
learned,  the  polite,  and  the  accomplished.  The  demagogue  cares 
not  for  the  good  opinion  of  the  higher  and  more  refined  classes 
of  society,  and  he  thinks  that  he  shows  his  courage  in  doing  so ; 
but  then  he  is  as  vain  as  the  other,  and  he  shows  this  by  drinking 
in  greedily  the  applause  of  the  many.  Most  of  those  whom  the 
world  worships  have  been  the  very  slaves  of  this  principle.  Lord 
Chancellor  E-rskine  calls  it  "  the  inherent  passion  of  genius." 
Fame  is  an  idol  before  whom  more  have  bowed  than  before  Baal 
or  Jupiter,  Brahma  or  Budha,  or  the  most  extensively  worshipped 
of  the  gods  of  heathenism.  The  sound  of  human  applause  is 
heard  by  ears  commonly  regarded  as  most  shut  against  it.  The 
student  hears  its  rising  sound  in  his  closet,  and  longs  to  bring 
forth  from  his  researches  a  work  that  may  swell  the  noise  yet 
louder  and  louder.  The  politician  and  patriot  listen  to  it  in  the 
shout  of  the  applauding  rabble,  or  the  whispered  compliment  of 
some  more  select,  and,  as  they  think,  more  discerning  circle.  The 
soldier  hears  it  louder  than  the  din  of  battle  w  the  voice  of  the 
trumpet,  and  is  prepared  to  follow  it  even  over  the  mangled  car- 
cases of  his  fellow-men.  It  is  suspected  that  it  has  not  been 
unheard  by  the  monk  in  his  cell,  or  the  nun  in  her  cloister.  The 
very  minister  of  religion  has  heard  its  echoes  when  he  is  arranging 
his  thoughts  for  addressing  his  congregation,  and  has  difficulty  in 

*  Swift. 
27 


418  GOVERNING    PRINCIPLES 

shutting  his  ears  to  it,  when  as  an  ambassador  he  is  delivering  the 
message  of  mercy  to  sinners. 

This  desire  does  not  seern  to  be  in  itself  either  virtuous  or  vi- 
cious. So  far  as  it  is  not  degraded  by  being  mingled  with  human 
wickedness,  it  serves  most  important  purposes  in  the  government 
of  the  world.  It  is  one  of  the  most  potent  of  those  principles  by 
which,  in  spite  of  prevailing  selfishness  arid  malice,  the  race  are 
banded  together.  It  is  the  true  source  of  much  that  we  call 
amiability,  or  that  spirit  which  leads  us  to  study  the  temper,  the 
tastes,  and  feelings  of  our  fellow-men.  Many  of  the  schemes  and 
devices  for  ameliorating  the  condition  of  mankind  have  originated 
in  this  feeling  rather  than  in  any  spirit  of  enlarged  benevolence. 
Take  away  this  intuitive  principle,  and  many  communities  of 
mankind  would  become  dens  of  wild  beasts,  with  their  interests 
and  their  passions  engaging  them  in  never-ceasing  conflicts. 

(3.)  The  desire  of  power.  This  principle,  which  seems  to  exist 
to  some  extent  in  all  minds,  exercises  a  prodigious  sway  over 
certain  minds,  and  may  become  one  of  the  deepest  passions  of  the 
human  breast.  It  is  a  peculiarity  of  it,  that,  more  than  any  other 
of  the  intuitive  desires,  it  seems  to  increase  with  the  exercise  and 
the  gratification  of  it,  and  comes  at  length  to  seize  the  mind  with 
an  iron  grasp.  In  regard  to  some  other  passions,  the  mind  is  often 
led  to  discover  their  vanity,  and  abandons  with  disgust  the  objects 
which  it  has  pursued  for  years ;  but  the  love  of  power  seems  to 
grow  with  advancing  years,  and  it  holds  its  possessor  in  a  state 
of  more  slavish  subjection,  than  he  holds  those  who  have  sub- 
mitted themselves  to  his  sway  ;  so  that  every  tyrant  is  himself 
ruled  over  by  a  tyranny  more  grasping  than  that  which  he  exer- 
cises towards  others. 

Looking  to  this  principle  as  it  is  in  itself,  and  not  in  its  sinful 
excess,  it  is  evident  that  it  must  have  a  powerful  influence  in 
uniting  mankind  together.  The  patriarchal,  the  chieftain,  and 
the  monarchical  systems,  derive  much  of  their  strength  from  it. 
It  is  the  cement  of  much  of  the  combined  action  that  produces 
such  mighty  effects.  It  is  seen  and  felt  in  republics,  as  well  as  in 
monarchies.  The  leader  of  a  band  of  his  school-companions,  of  a 
troop  of  youths,  of  a  village,  of  a  valley,  of  a  town  or  country,  of  a 
powerful  state  party,  of  a  cabinet  or  a  parliament — these  may  all 
be  under  its  sway,  no  less  effectually  than  the  monarch  upon  the 
throne,  and  may  each  be  the  nucleus  around  which  there  cluster 
numbers,  who  would  otherwise  be  isolated  in  all  their  actions,  and 


NElTttER,   VIRTUOUS    NOR   VICIOUS.  419 

wavering  and  unsteady  in  all  their  movements.  All  unknown  to 
the  parties  themselves,  wave  has  rolled  on  wave  to  keep  this  world 
from  stagnating,  and  all  perhaps  under  the  attracting  power  of 
some  satellite,  which  is  itself  attracted  to  a  planet  rolling  round 
some  central  sun.  It  is  thus  that  one  great  central  energy,  one 
great  ruling  mind,  has  held  together  and  swayed  the  destinies 
of  kingdoms,  and  reached  in  its  influence  through  successive  gen- 
erations. 

(4.)  The  desire  of  society.  This  is  a  propensity  which  man 
may  resist,  under  the  influence  of  other  and  stronger  propensities ; 
still  it  is  one  which  every  human  being  feels.  "  It  is  not  good  for 
man  to  be  alone.5'  The  hermit  draws  such  praise  from  his  ad- 
mirers, just  because  he  is  resisting  one  of  the  strongest  principles 
of  our  nature.  Nor  is  it  needful,  in  support  of  our  argument,  to 
plead  that  this  love  of  society  is  a  principle  which  cannot  be  re- 
solved into  anything  simpler.  It  may  very  possibly  be  the  result 
of  other  feelings,  which  are  called  forth  by  the  very  position  in 
which  man  is  placed.  Still  it  cannot  be  doubted,  that  it  is  of 
spontaneous  growth  in  the  human  mind,  and  is  not  the  result 
of  any  voluntary  and  far-sighted  calculations.  Springing  up  as 
it  does  under  the  influence  of  natural  causes,  it  is  made  to  accom- 
plish many  important  results.  It  lightens  many  hours  that  would 
otherwise  be  intolerably  heavy ;  and  perfumes,  by  the  kindnesses 
which  flow  from  it,  the  very  atmosphere  of  which  society  breathes. 
Hence  many  of  the  amenities  of  society,  and  the  numberless 
offices  of  kind  and  obliging  neighborhood.  It  raises  a  smile  upon 
many  a  countenance,  that  would  otherwise  settle  into  a  murky 
sulkiness ;  and  calls  forth  many  a  cheerful  remark  and  pleasant 
anecdote  and  smart  repartee,  from  lips  that  would  otherwise  be 
sealed  in  silence.  This  power  may  not  act  at  large  distances ; 
but  like  capillary  attraction,  it  holds  bodies  that  are  near  com- 
pactly together ;  and  banding  as  it  does  each  little  circle,  and  the 
members  of  each  little  circle  being  connected  with  the  neighbor- 
ing circles,  it  reaches  in  its  influence  over  the  whole  of  society. 

(5.)  The  love  of  property.  Some  analysts  of  the  human  mind 
have  resolved  this  principle  into  a  modification  of  the  love  of 
power.  Be  it  so,  as  it  is  not  the  less  the  spontaneous  product  of 
the  native  principles  of  the  human  mind.  And  in  whatever  other 
principle  it  may  originate,  it  becomes  at  last  an  independent  prin- 
ciple of  action.  In  some  of  its  forms,  it  may  appear  to  be  about 
the  most  sordid  of  all  human  passions.  But  speaking  of  it,  not 


420  THE    AFFECTIONS. 

in  the  abuse  of  it,  but  as  it  is  in  itself,  it  wields  a  most  powerful 
influence,  holding  men  as  by  gravity,  to  this  earth  on  which  God 
has  placed  them.  In  some  of  its  aspects,  nothing  can  be  more 
irrational  than  to  toil  for  years,  as  many  do,  for  property  which  is 
never  to  be  enjoyed,  and  from  which  we  must  speedily  be  sepa- 
rated. Still  the  very  habit  has  given  steadiness  of  aim  and  a 
spirit  of  caution  to  individual  minds,  and  the  general  issue  is  the 
accumulation  of  wealth,  with  the  powers  which  wealth  puts  in 
operation.  More  beneficial  still,  there  are  the  refinements  and 
the  elegancies  which  wealth  produces,  and  the  preservatist  feeling 
which  the  existence  of  valuable  property  spreads  throughout  the 
more  influential  portion  of  the  community.  Satirists  may  ridicule 
wealth  as  they  please,  and  describe  the  poorest  nations  as  the 
happiest,  still  it  cannot  be  denied  that  accumulated  property  tends 
to  produce  an  elegance  and  a  social  order  which  cannot  be  found 
in  communities  stricken  with  poverty,  and  constantly  contending 
about  the  very  necessaries  of  existence. 

Now.  these  appetites  and  desires  are  among  the  most  influential 
of  the  principles  by  which  human  nature  is  governed.  It  is  by 
them,  fully  as  much  as  by  any  calculating  self-love,  that  mankind 
are  induced  to  maintain  an  outward  decency  of  deportment,  and 
society  at  large  is  made  to  clothe  itself  in  becoming  decorum. 
Some  of  these  principles  give  life,  movement,  and  outward  progress 
to  society,  and  others  impart  to  it  strength  and  endurance.  Some 
act  with  a  springing  elastic  force,  and  others  have  a  gravitating 
power.  Some  tend  to  disjoin  what  ought  to  be  separated,  and 
others  to  band  together  the  things  which  should  be  united.  The 
implanting  of  these  principles  diverse  from  one  another,  and  yet 
all  tending  to  the  same  end,  shows  how  admirable  the  provision 
made  for  the  social  order  of  the  world. 

Yet  so  far  as  mankind  are  under  the  influence  of  these  prin- 
ciples, they  are  neither  virtuous  nor  the  opposite.  It  is  to  be  re- 
membered, however,  that  the  very  possession  of  these  intuitions, 
like  the  possession  of  high  intellectual  qualities,  brings  along  with 
it  additional  responsibility — and  when  they  are  abused,  additional 
guilt. 

SECTION  II.— THE  SAME  SUBJECT— THE  AFFECTIONS. 

WE  are  to  consider  the  emotions  exclusively  under  one  aspect, 
and  that  is  as  a  means  of  government.  They  are  not  so  fre- 
quently viewed  in  this  light  as  they  ought  to  be  by  writers  on 


THE    AFFECTIONS.  421 

ethics  and  mental  philosophy.  We  have  only  carefully  to  examine 
them  to  discover  that,  like  every  other  part  of  man's  nature,  they 
are  a  means  of  rendering  him  dependent  on  his  Governor. 

In  examining  these  emotions  it  may  be  useful,  first  of  all,  to 
observe  that  they  are  not  independent  states  of  mind.  Emotion 
is  always  attached  to  some  conception  formed  by  the  intellectual 
faculties,  Man  is  so  constituted  that  the  conception  of  certain 
objects  is  accompanied  with  emotion,  or  as  we  would  rather  say, 
that  certain  conceptions  are  emotional.  The  conception  of  prob- 
able pain,  produces  fear,  and  the  conception  of  ill  usage  inflicted 
produces  anger.  Emotions  are  thus  mainly  dependent  on  the  in- 
tellectual conceptions  to  which  they  are  attached.  But  still,  as 
consciousness  attests,  they  are  something  more  than  the  mere 
mental  conception  upon  which,  as  well  as  upon  the  general  train 
of  association,  they  exercise  a  powerful  influence.  The  author 
of  our  nature,  in  making  the  conception  of  certain  objects  emotional, 
has  added  vastly  to  man's  capacity  for  enjoyment,  and  has  also 
provided  for  himself  a  powerful  instrument  of  government. 

The  basis  of  every  emotion  is  a  conception.  But  all  conceptions 
do  not  raise  emotions.  The  conceptions  which  raise  emotions  are 
all  conceptions  of  objects  supposed  to  be  good  or  evil,  as  supposed 
to  be  connected,  for  instance,  with  pleasure  or  pain,  with  right  or 
wrong.  We  thus  see  the  importance  of  right  principles,  or  motive 
powers  in  the  mind.  In  a  mind  of  right  principle,  that  which  is 
good  is  always  conceived  of  as  good,  and  that  which  is  evil  as 
evil,  and  the  emotions  flow  responsive  to  the  guiding  principle. 
When  the  motive  power  is  allowed  by  the  will  to  become  perverted, 
and  objects  are  conceived  of  as  good  which  are  evil,  and  as  evil 
which  are  good — the  result  is  a  disordered  sensibility  disturbing 
the  whole  equilibrium  of  the  soul,  and  like  the  wind  carrying  us 
away. 

We  do  not  purpose  discussing  in  this  section  the  whole  of  the 
varied  emotions  of  the  human  breast,  nor  will  the  common  divi- 
sions or  classifications  suit  our  purpose,  and  so  we  are  necessitated 
in  the  notice  we  take  of  them  to  form  an  arrangement  of  our  own. 
Th«se  emotions,  like  the  other  instruments  employed  by  God, 
physical  and  moral,  contemplate  two  ends,  one  of  excitement  and 
encouragement,  and  another  of  restraint  and  arrest.  The  emo- 
dons  may  all  be  viewed  under  this  double  aspect.  To  every  emo- 
tion of  the  one  class  there  is  a  corresponding  emotion  of  the  other 
•class.  Thus— 


422  THE    AFFECTIONS'. 

(1.)  Some  are  INSTIGATIVE,  and  others  ARRESTIVE  ;  (2.)  soroa 
are  ADHESIVE,  and  others  REPULSIVE;  (3.)  some  are  REMUNERA- 
TIVE, and  others  PUNITIVE  ;  (4.)  some  .are  RESPONSIVE  TO  jovr 
and  others  RESPONSIVE  TO  SORROW. 

I.  THE  ARRESTIVE  AND  INSTIGATIVE.  The  conception  of 
possible  or  probable  evil  and  good  must  always  raise  emotion. 
The  conception  of  evil,  as  about  to  come  upon  us,  leads  to  appre- 
hension, fear,  dread,  terror,  according  to  the  greatness  or  proba- 
bility of  the  evil.  This  is  in  itself  an  agitating  frame  of  mindr 
and  so  rouses  the  mind  from  lethargy ;  and  like  all  emotions,  it 
quickens  the  train  of  thought  clustering  round  the  object,  and  thu* 
suggests  means  of  escape  from  the  apprehended  peril.  The  ap- 
prehension of  good  as  about  to  be  conferred,  on  the  other  hand? 
leads  to  hope  and  expectation  ;  and  the  buoyancy  of  spirit  pro- 
duced prompts  us  to  use  the  means  required  in  order  to  procure 
the  contemplated  good,  and  leads  us  to  prepare  for  its  reception. 
To  this  same  class  are  to  be  referred,  as  partaking  of  the  nature 
both  of  the  arrestive  and  instigative,  those  emotions  of  astonish- 
ment, surprise,  and  wonder,  which  arise  on  the  contemplation  of 
new,  unexpected,  and  strange  phenomena,  and  in  regard  to  which 
the  mind  is  not  aware  for  a  time  whether  they  may  be  for  good  or 
evil.  The  emotions  now  named  tend  to  summon  the  attention, 
and  to  brace  the  mind  to  meet  the  emergency.  We  owe  to  the 
arrestive  feelings  much  of  the  caution  which  prevails  among  man- 
kind, with  all  the  useful  virtues  that  grow  upon  caution.  We 
owe  to  the  instigative  feelings  a  large  portion  of  human  energy 
and  activity.  One  half  of  man's  exertions,  and  more  than  one 
half  of  his  happiness,  proceed  from  hope.  Where  there  is  hope 
there  will  generally  be  some  life  ;  when  hope  ceases,  action  also 
ceases.  God  in  his  administration  employs  both  these  classes  of 
emotions  ;  and  by  the  one  he  can  cast  at  particular  times,  as  at 
the  time  of  a  plague,  for  instance,  a  gloom  accompanied  with  utter 
helplessness  over  the  minds  of  a  whole  community,  and  by  the 
other,  send  forth  half  a  continent,  as  was  done  in  the  times  of  the 
Crusades  on  some  great  enterprise. 

IL  THERE  ARE  THE  ADHESIVE  AND  REPULSIVE.  To  the 
former  of  these  belong  our  attachments  to  persons  and  objects  sup- 
posed by  us  to  be  possessed  of  good  qualities.  In  such  cases  the- 
mind  experiences  a  delight  in  the  contemplation  of  the  object,  and 
specially  in  the  presence  of  the  object  as  fitted  to  make  that  con- 
templation more  vivid,  and  also  a  tendency  to  cling  to  that  object. 


THE    AFFECTIONS.  423 

Opposed  tQ  these  feelings  we  have  another  class,  leading  us  to 
abhor  and  turn  away  from  certain  objects,  as  supposed  to  possess 
•evil  qualities  ;  they  are  the  feelings  of  aversion  and  hatred.  When 
we  are  led  to  contemplate  persons  as  having  conferred  favors  upon 
us,  we  are  inclined  towards  them  by  a  feeling  which,  if  not  grati- 
tude, (for  gratitude  as  implying  wish  is  a  virtue,)  is  often  the  in- 
centive to  gratitude.  When  we  contemplate  them,  on  the  other 
hand,  as  inflicting  injury  upon  us,  we  are  led  to  repel  them  from 
us,  or  to  flee  from  them;  and  the  emotions  that  arise  are  anger, 
indignation,  and  such  like,  feelings  no  way  sinful  if  unaccom- 
panied with  sinful  desires.  Every  moralist  has  observed  how  ad- 
mirable the  provision  which  is  made  through  these  instinctive 
affections  for  the  instant  repulsion,  and  so  the  prevention  of  inju- 
ries. The  feeling  arms  the  mind  on  the  instant  with  weapons, 
and  provides  it  with  resources  to  check  or  throw  back  the  evil, 
when  cool  reflection  might  be  too  slow  or  too  feeble  in  its  opera- 
tions. It  has  often  been  noticed,  as  another  beautiful  provision, 
that  all  the  benign  affections  are  pleasant  at  the  time,  while  all 
the  malign  affections  are  unpleasant ;  and  by  this  means,  as  well 
as  by  many  others,  God  would  lead  us  to  cherish  the  former,  and 
to  expel  the  latter  as  soon  as  possible.  Revenge,  even  when  suc- 
cessful, has  within  it  its  own  punishment,  a  revenge  of  the  revenge. 
The  Greeks  represent  Medea  as  successful  in  wrapping  the  bride 
of  whom  she  was  jealous  in  a  burning  robe ;  but  to  show  the 
nature  of  her  enjoyment  in  consequence,  she  was  spoken  of  as 
going  off  in  a  chariot  of  serpents — no  unfit  emblem  of  the  feelings 
which  accompany  gratified  resentment. 

III.  THERE  ARE  THE  REMUNERATIVE  AND  THE  PUNITIVE. 
We  use  these  phrases  not  as  implying  anything  moral,  but  merely 
as  indicating  that  these  emotions  are  the  results  of  steps  that  have 
gone  before.     They  are  the  emotions  which  arise  on   the  contem- 
plation of  the  good  or  the  evil  as  already  attained.     They  are  such, 
emotions  as  gladnews,  joy  and  complacency  on  the  one  hand,  and 
grief  and  depression  on  the  other.     They  compose  a  large  portion 
of  the  enjoyment  which  the  good,  so  long  expected  it  may  be,  con- 
fers, and  a  large  portion  of  the  miseries  which  the  loss  brings. 
They  constitute  the  mental  elevation  and  the  mental  depression 
to  which  success  and  disappointment  conduct.     They  become,  in 
consequence,  among  the  most  potent  of  the  instruments  of  the 
Divine  government. 

IV.  There  are  the  emotions  which  beat  RESPONSIVE  TO  THE 


424 


THE    AFFECTIONS 


JOYS  AND  SORROWS.  Man  is  so  constituted  that  he  experiences 
emotion  not  only  when  he  contemplates  good  and  evil  as  accruing 
to  himself,  but  good  and  evil  as  accruing  to  others.  This  is  one 
of  the  most  beneficent  parts  of  his  constitution.  This  sympathy 
is  a  powerful  means  of  lessening  sorrow  and  increasing  happiness. 
•'A  friend  shares  my  sorrow,  and  niakes  it  but  a  moiety ;  but  he 
swells  my  joy,  and  makes  it  double.  For  so  two  channels  divide 
the  river  and  lessen  into  rivulets,  and  make  it  fordable  and  apt,  to 
be  drunk  up  at  the  first  revels  of  the  Syrian  star ;  but  two  torches 
do  not  divide  but  increase  the  flame  ;  and  though  my  tears  are 
the  sooner  dried  up  when  they  run  upon  my  friend's  cheeks  in  the 
furrows  of  compassion,  yet  when  my  flame  hath  kindled  his  lamp 
we  unite  the  glories,  and  make  them  radiant  like  the  golden 
candlesticks  that  burn  before  the  throne  of  God,  because  they 
shine  by  numbers,  by  unions,  and  confederations  of  light  and 
joy."*  It  is  a  bountiful  provision  that  in  ordinary  cases  sympathy 
with  sorrow  is  vastly  more  intense  than  sympathy  with  joy.  The 
joy  can  do  with  or  without  the  sympathy,  but  the  sorrow  needs 
and  demands  the  sympathy  to  alleviate  the  grief,  or  stir  up  action 
which  may  remove  the  cause  of  it. 

But  we  cannot  understand  the  nature  of  the  affections  and  pas- 
sions, by  merely  looking  at  the  individual  emotions.  One  of  the 
most  wonderful  characteristics  of  the  emotions  in  our  apprehen- 
sion, is  their  power  over  the  train  of  thought.  The  affections  and 
passions  do  not  consist  so  much  of  single  emotions,  as  of  trains 
of  emotions,  or  of  trains  of  thought,  all  of  an  emotional  kind. 
Whenever  affection  is  deep,  and  passion  high,  there  is  a  tumult  of 
i  noughts  and  feelings,  crowding  like  a  mob  round  a  point ;  and 
yet  often  like  that  mob,  scarcely  able  to  tell  what  is  bringing  them 
together.  It  is  this  tendency  to  run  in  a  train  which  renders 
these  emotions  among  the  chief  sources  of  human  happiness  and 
human  misery,  and  about  the  highest  rewards  of  the  well-regu- 
lated, and  the  most  fearful  punishment  of  the  ill-regulated  mind. 

We  have  entered  so  far  upon  the  examination  of  the  emotions, 
T.O  show  how  fitted  they  are  to  become  instruments  of  government. 
Like  aeriform  bodies,  they  are  elastic — admitting  of  great  exten- 
sion, and  great  compression  ;  and  also  all-penetrating,  and  admit- 
ting of  great  rapidity  of  action.  They  are  seen  to  be  especially 
powerful,  when  we  reflect  that  God  can  employ  the  physical  world 

*  Jeremy  Taylor. 


GOVERNING    PRINCIPLES    THAT    ARE    EVIL.  425 

in  correspondence  with  these  internal  feelings  to  turn  mankind  as 
he  pleases,  in  spite  of  their  rebellion  and  folly. 

But  we  must  be  careful  in  speaking  of  these  emotions  or  affec- 
tions, to  distinguish  between  them  and  the  wishes  and  desires  and 
volitions  of  the  mind.  These  emotions  do  commonly  lead  to 
wishes  and  desires ;  but  these  wishes  and  desires  are  always  some- 
thing more  than  mere  emotions,  and  may  be  virtuous  or  vicious, 
which  mere  emotions  never  are  in  themselves.  And  this  distinc- 
tion enables  us  to  settle  the  question  so  often  discussed,  as  to  the 
virtuousness  or  the  sin  fulness  of  the  natural  affections.  None  of 
them  is  either  the  one  or  the  other  in  itself;  nor  can  there  be  any 
moral  element  till  they  stir  up  desire.  Do  our  attachments  lead, 
as  they  are  intended,  to  true  benevolence — then  the  complex  affec- 
tion is  virtuous  ;  but  it  is  so,  because  it  contains  benevolence.  Do 
the  repulsive  passions  stir  up,  as  they  too  frequently  do,  in  man's 
disordered  nature,  revengeful  wishes — then  they  become  sinful  from 
that  instant.  In  every  case,  the  good  or  the  evil  lies  not  in  the 
affection  itself,  but  in  its  accompanying  desire  or  volition.  So  far 
as  the  emotions  are  disconnected  from  virtuous  or  sinful  wishes 
and  voluntary  determinations,  they  have  no  moral  character  what- 
ever, but  are  mere  instruments  employed  in  the  Divine  adminis- 
tration. Yet  how  much  of  human  virtue,  so  called,  consists  in  the 
mere  possession  of  the  benign  emotions.  Alas,  how  much  of  hu- 
man vice,  properly  so  called,  consists  in  the  abuse  of  these  parts  of 
our  admirable  constitution. 

SECTION  III.— GOVERNING  PRINCIPLES  THAT  ARE  EVIL. 

We  are  now  entering  on  topics  of  considerable  difficulty  and 
delicacy.  Some  sensitive  minds  shrink  from  the  anatomy  to 
which  we  are  to  subject  human  motives,  and  the  manner  in  which, 
in  our  dissection,  we  must  lay  bare  the  muscles  and  organs  of  hu- 
man life.  But  bold  spirits  have  entered  this  region,  and  drawn 
from  it  the  most  pernicious  doctrine,  and  we  must  follow  them, 
were  it  only  to  counteract  the  evil  use  which  they  have  made  of 
their  observations. 

In  this  inquiry  great  care  must  be  taken,  first,  not  to  make  God 
chargeable  with  the  evil  principles  which  are  made  to  serve  a  use- 
ful purpose  in  the  government  of  the  world;  and,  secondly,fto 
show  that  though  there  may  be  beneficial  ends  served  by  the  sin- 
ful affection  or  principle,  yet  the  guilt  of  the  agent  is  not  thereby 
diminished. 


426  GOVERNING    PRINCIPLES    THAT    ARE    EVIL. 

There  is  a  constant  tendency  in  the  present  day  to  fall  into  the 
latter  of  these  errors.  Crimes  are  discovered  to  be  links  in  the 
chain  of  causes  on  which  hang  good  and  glorious  results ;  and,  in 
approving  of  the  issue,  historians  have  sometimes  been  inclined  to 
justify  all  the  steps  which  have  led  to  it.  One  class  of  writers, 
delighted  with  the  order,  the  peace,  and  physical  comfort  found 
under  some  despotical  governments,  have  been  led  to  transfer  their 
praises  to  the  very  acts  of  tyranny  and  cruelty  which  have  been 
instrumental  in  producing  such  results.  Another  class,  observing 
how  political  convulsions  have  led  to  great  social  improvements, 
have  been  tempted  to  excuse  the  pretension,  deceit,  and  violence 
employed  to  ferment  the  popular  mind.  Some  of  those  writers 
who  profess  to  be  elevated  above  all  prejudice  have,  in  the  way  of 
showing  their  affected  candor,  allowed  the  issue  of  actions  to  in- 
fluence their  moral  sentiments,  and  have  forgotten  that  virtue  is 
virtue,  and  that  vice  is  vice,  independently  of  the  incidental  results 
flowing  from  them.  Literature  is  never  engaged  in  a  work  more 
unbecoming  its  high  functions  than  when  it  is  shedding  a  halo 
around  successful  crime,  or  disparaging  the  excellence  of  humble 
and  unsuccessful  merit.  Arnold  asks,  "  Whether  the  Christian 
ever  feels  more  keenly  awake  to  the  purity  of  the  spirit  of  the 
gospel  when  he  reads  the  history  of  crimes  related  with  no  sense 
of  their  evil?"  Never  is  history  fulfilling  its  high  office  so  appro- 
priately as  when  it  is  stripping  splendid  vice  of  its  false  colors,  and 
calling  the  attention  to  the  flowers  which  would  otherwise  bloom 
in  the  shade,  unnoticed  by  the  vulgar  eye. 

While  history  and  philosophy  must  specially  guard  against 
being  led  astray  by  the  prepossessions  which  fortune  instils,  they 
are  most  assuredly  at  liberty  to  contemplate  and  to  weigh  the  good 
effects  which  will  sometimes  flow  from  actions  which  are  evil  in 
themselves.  While  they  denounce  in  no  measured  language  the 
perpetrators  of  the  crimes,  let  them  praise  the  administration  of 
God,  who  can  bring  good  out  of  evil,  and  control  such  rebellious 
elements. 

Meanwhile  we  observe  what  is  the  nature  of  the  pillars  on 
which  the  world  destined  to  destruction  is  supported,  and  how, 
when  God's  purposes  are  finished  with  them,  and  these  pillars  are 
tgfcen  down,  what  fearful  effects  must  follow. 

Attention  was  called,  in  a  former  section,  to  the  beneficial  effects 
following  from  the  intuitive  desires,  which  are  neither  virtuous  nor 


GOVERNING    PRINCIPLES    THAT    ARE    EVIL.  427 

vicious  in  themselves.     Let  us  now  contemplate  the  results  that 
follow  when  these  principles  are  abused  and  become  vicious. 

In  themselves  all  the  actions  which  proceed  from  such  perverted 
desires  are  evil.  No  attempt  should  be  made  to  defend  them  on 
the  ground  of  their  consequences.  To  palliate  them  is  to  palliate 
sin.  To  approve  of  them  is  to  partake  of  their  guilt. 

Yet  every  one  sees,  that  in  this  sinful  world  there  are  certain 
effects,  which  are  good  in  themselves,  following  from  vanity  and 
ambition.  Take  away  these  incentives  to  action,  and  it  is  impos- 
sible to  calculate  how  much  earthly  excellence  would  be  taken 
away,  or  rather  to  say  how  little  would  remain.  "  All  the  works 
of  human  industry  are  in  a  great  measure  referable  to  ambition 
of  some  sort,  that,  however  humble  it  may  seem  to  minds  of 
prouder  views,  is  yet  relatively  as  strong  as  the  ambition  of  the 
proudest.  We  toil  that  we  may  have  some  little  influence,  or 
some  little  distinction,  however  small  the  number  of  our  inferiors 
may  be."*  We  are  not  denying  the  existence  of  genuine  philan- 
thropy, but  it  requires  but  a  very  little  acquaintance  with  the 
lives  of  poets,  statesmen,  artists,  warriors — and  philosophers  too,  to 
gather  from  the  motives  which  they  avow,  that,  but  for  the  praise 
of  men,  and  the  influence  expected  to  be  obtained,  they  would  not 
have  made  such  sacrifices  or  practised  such  self-denial,  and  the 
world  would  not  have  reaped  from  their  labors  the  benefit  which 
has  accrued. 

The  advantages  arising  from  frugality,  and  this  even  when  it 
assumes  the  form  of  avarice,  have  been  pointed  out  by  the  father 
of  political  economy.  "Parsimony,"  he  says,  "by  increasing  the 
fund  which  is  destined  for  the  maintenance  of  productive  hands, 
tends  to  increase  the  number  of  those  hands  whose  labor  adds  to 
the  value  of  the  subject  on  which  it  is  bestowed.  It  tends,  there- 
fore, to  increase  the  exchangeable  value  of  the  annual  produce  of 
the  land  and  labor  of  the  country.  It  puts  into  motion  an  addi- 
tional quantity  of  industry,  which  gives  an  additional  value  to  the 
annual  produce."  f  Such  are  its  effects  in  an  economical  point  of 
view,  and  its  influence  in  spreading  a  spirit  of  caution,  prudence, 
industry,  temperance,  and  foresight  throughout  a  community,  are 
not  less  salutary.  The  virtues  of  poorer  nations,  and  of  the  labor- 
ing classes,  are  all  intimately  connected  with  that  frugality  on 
which  parents  set  so  high  a  value  and  which  they  are  accustomed 
to  recommend  to  their  children, 

*  Brown's  Lectures ;  Lect.  Ixviii.  f  Wealth  of  Nations,  B.  HL  c.  iii. 


428  GOVERNING    PRINCIPLES    THAT    ARE    EVIL. 

But  it  has  not  been  observed  by  Dr.  Adam  Smith,  that  in  the 
overruling  providence  of  God  beneficial  effects  also  follow  from  the 
opposite  spirit,  that  of  prodigality.  ".It  is  quite  obvious,"  says 
Malthus,  "  that  the  principle  of  saving  pushed  to  excess  would 
destroy  the  motive  to  production.  If  every  person  were  satisfied 
with  the  simplest  food,  the  poorest  clothing,  and  the  meanest 
houses,  it  is  certain  that  no  other  sort  of  food  and  clothing  would 
be  in  existence ;  and  as  there  would  be  no  adequate  motive  to 
the  proprietors  of  land  to  cultivate  well,  not  only  the  wealth  de- 
rived from  convenience  and  luxuries  would  be  quite  at  an  end,  but, 
if  the  same  division  of  land  continued,  the  production  of  food 
would  be  prematurely  checked,  and  population  would  come  to  a 
stand  long  before  the  soil  had  been  cultivated."*  It  has  not  been 
observed,  either  by  Smith  or  Malthus,  that  it  is  by  the  free  opera- 
tion of  both  that  national  wealth  is  promoted.  The  latter,  indeed, 
speaks  of  an  intermediate  point,  at  which  the  "encouragement  to 
the  increase  of  wealth  is  the  greatest."  But  truly  it  is  not  by  this 
happy  medium  that  the  economic  prosperity  of  a  nation  is  fostered, 
so  much  as  by  giving  full  liberty  to  both  extremes ;  and  the  issue 
is,  that  capital  is  accumulated  by  the  frugality  of  one  section  of 
the  community,  and  is  again  lavished  on  productive  labor  by  the 
prodigality  of  another.  These  centripetal  and  centrifugal  forces 
are  held  in  balance  by  the  nice  arrangements  of  the  providence 
of  God,  and  according  as  the  one  or  other  prevails,  so  is  the  path 
which  a  nation  describes — so  is  it  planet  or  comet-like  in  its  orbit. 
We  see  how  a  nation  may  owe  its  commercial  and  political  pros- 
perity, not  so  much  to  the  wisdom  of  its  statesmen  or  citizens  as 
to  the  skilful  adjustments  of  the  government  of  God. 

These  remarks  apply  to  the  abuse  of  all  the  instinctive  springs 
of  action  in  the  human  breast,  and  it  is  not  needful  to  treat  of 
them  in  order.  The  love  of  society,  for  example,  while  it  gives 
encouragement  to  extravagance,  and  often  leads  to  bankruptcy, 
gives  rise  meanwhile  to  those  pleasing  qualities  which  are  expres- 
sively called  social.  The  ages  and  nations  that  have  been  most 
addicted  to  sociality,  as  England  in  the  reign  of  Charles  II.,  and 
France  in  the  reign  of  Louis  XIV.,  have  also  been  characterized 
by  their  politeness,  arid  the  flow  of  pleasing  conversation.  Some 
may  remember  how  the  old  West  India  planters,  degraded  as  they 
frequently  were  by  the  relations  in  which  they  stood  to  their 
slaves,  had  a  pleasing  relief  given  to  what  would  otherwise  have 
*  Political  Economy,  p.  8. 


GOVERNING    PRINCIPLES    THAT    ABE    EVIL.  429 

been  an  habitual  selfishness  and  sensuality,  by  the  hospitality  and 
kindness  which  their  circumstances,  as  so  shut  out  from  other 
congenial  society,  led  them  to  exhibit  to  one  another. 

Nay,  there  are  incidental  advantages  springing  from  the  malig- 
nant passions  under  some  of  the  aspects  in  which  they  present 
themselves. 

No  doubt,  these  passions  would  be  unmingled  evils  in  a  world 
in  which  sin  was  otherwise  unknown.  In  the  actual  world  they 
are  also  evils  ;  but  then  to  keep  wickedness  from  becoming  intoler- 
able, the  evils  are  made  to  counteract  each  other,  as  in  another 
department  of  God's  works  one  kind  of  insect  and  wild  beast  is 
made  to  destroy  another. 

In  a  world  in  which  intentional  ill  usage  and  injustice  were 
unknown,  the  passions  of  anger  and  resentment  would  have  been 
useless,  or  worse  than  useless.  But  it  cannot  be  denied,  that  in 
the  real  world  the  resentful  passions  are  often  the  means  of  scar- 
ing persons  from  the  infliction  of  injury,  when  higher  principle 
could  have  accomplished  no  such  end.  Full  of  injustice  as  this 
world  is,  insults  and  injuries  would  have  been  much  more  frequent, 
but  for  the  instinctive  passion  which  is  ready  to  rise  up  and  re- 
dress the  wrong.  Sinful  though  private  feuds,  duels,  and  the  ma- 
jority of  wars  have  been,  it  is  evident,  notwithstanding,  that  they 
have  been  the  means  of  checking  other  evils  which  would  have 
spread  inextricable  disorder  throughout  society.  True  it  is  that 
this  circumstance  does  not  lessen  the  sinfulness  of  the  evil  passion, 
nor  does  it  show  that  other  and  innocent  and  far  more  effectual 
restraints  might  not  have  been  laid  on  these  evils  than  are  laid 
by  instruments  which  in  themselves  are  evil  j  yet  it  proves,  that 
while  the  government  of  God  does  not  create  either  evil,  it  uses 
one  evil  to  restrain  another. 

We  have  often  been  struck  in  reading  the  narrative  of  the  Old 
Testament,  to  find  one  wicked  man  employed  to  punish  another. 
This  feature  of  the  Divine  government  comes  out  very  strikingly 
in  the  declining  age  of  the  history  of  the  Hebrews,  and  more  par- 
ticularly of  the  ten  tribes.  Jeroboam  is  employed  to  punish  the 
house  of  David ;  and  Omri,  in  a  later  age,  is  raised  up  to  punish 
the  house  of  Jeroboam  ;  while  Jehu  appears  at  an  opportune  time 
to  avenge  the  evil  wrought  by  Omri  and  his  descendant  Ahab. 
The  method  is  observable  throughout  the  whole  economy  of  God's 
providence,  as  revealed  iff  the  sacred  volume.  Egypt,  Nineveh, 
Babylon,  and  Persia,  are  made  the  instruments  for  the  punish 


430  GOVERNING    PRINCIPLES    THAT    ARE    EVIL. 

ing  the  Jews,  and  themselves  are  punished  for  the  evil  which 
they  wrought.  We  have  at  times  wondered  at  this,  and  felt  as  if 
there  was  something  in  it  which  seemed  to  reflect  on  the  Divine 
government.  But  then,  we  observe  the  same  method  of  govern- 
ment in  actual  operation  in  the  world  around  us ;  and  we  have 
only  to  consider  that  as  God  is  no  way  participating  in  the  guilt 
of  the  parties,  who  are  left  entirely  to  their  own  freedom,  so 
he  is  no  way  implicated  in  their  conduct  by  the  use  to  which  he 
turns  it. 

Envy  itself,  though  among  the  basest  and  most  malignant  of 
human  passions,  has  served  certain  purposes  of  restraint.  Not 
that  we  would  excuse,  much  less  defend,  this  mean  passion.  It 
withers  under  the  sunshine  of  another's  prosperity,  and  ever  springs 
up  most  luxuriantly  upon  decayed  fortunes,  and  the  wrecks  of 
blasted  reputations.  It  wounds,  with  its  serpent  tongue,  the  very 
fairest  forms  of  earthly  greatness.  The  lovelier  the  flower,  it  is 
the  more  eager  to  light  upon  it.  Yet  it  cannot  be  doubted  that, 
evil  as  it  is,  it  has  counteracted  evils  which  would  otherwise  have 
hurried  away  individuals  and  society  at  large,  into  the  extremest 
folly.  There  is  ground  for  the  name  which  Crabbe  represents 
flattery  as  giving  to  it  when  he  calls  it  "  virtue's  jealous  friend." 
It  is  a  means  of  checkingfthe  love  of  fame  on  the  part  of  indi- 
viduals, and  of  the  admiration  of  great  men  on  the  part  of  the 
public,  when  these  might  become  excessive.  It  may  be  argued, 
too,  that  without  such  a  principle  operating  as  a  check,  the  vain, 
the  forward,  and  the  audacious,  would,  by  means  of  hypocrisy  and 
pretence,  delude  mankind  into  the  greatest  extravagance  and 
follies.  It  would  be  vastly  better,  no  doubt,  that  these  preten- 
sions were  checked  by  the  good  sense  and  high  moral  feeling  of 
the  community ;  but  in  the  absence  of  these,  envy  has  been  ser- 
viceable in  accomplishing  the  same  end.  Of  use  in  detecting  sim- 
ulated, it  is  also  of  service  in  increasing  real  excellence  ;  and  it 
makes  the  truly  great  man  still  greater,  in  so  far  as  it  compels 
him  to  cultivate  habitual  circumspection,  and  prompts  to  farther 
exertion  when  he  might  be  induced  to  give  himself  over  to  indo- 
lence, as  the  gadfly  buzzing  round  the  ox  rouses  him  from  his 
lethargy,  when  he  would  recline  too  long  under  the  shade.  It  is 
not  unworthy  of  being  observed,  that  those  who  have  their  char- 
acter fully  established  rise  at  last  far  above  the  reach  of  detraction. 
The  great  man  is  like  the  luminary  of  day  which,  as  it  circles 
above  the  horizon,  pales  the  wax  tapers  which  before  shed  their 


GOVERNING    PRINCIPLES    THAT    ARE    EVIL.  431 

feeble  light,  and  they  cast  their  blackening  shadows ;  but  he  rises 
higher  and  higher  till  all  the  shadows  vanish.  Some  persons  may 
be  inclined  farther  to  assert,  that  envy  is  so  far  advantageous, 
inasmuch  as,  attacking  only  prosperity,  "  while  misery  passed 
unstung  away,"*  it  so  far  equalizes  the  inequalities  of  external 
fortune. 

There  is  no  one  who  does  not  lament  the  prevalence  of  evil- 
speaking  under  its  various  forms.  Every  one  has  seen  its  "fatal 
effects,  for  it  reigns  among  all  classes,  from  our  rural  districts  and 
retired  hamlets  up  to  the  circles  of  the  nobility  and  the  court  of 
the  sovereign.  Yet  who  can  tell  how  many  incipient  vices  have 
been  checked  by  this  scandal,  or  the  salutary  dread  of  it  ?  In  this 
wicked  world  it  sometimes  serves  the  same  purpose  as  those  in- 
sects which  are  the  scavengers  of  nature — it  prevents  society  from 
becoming  intolerably  corrupt  and  putrid.  It  would  be  infinitely 
better,  no  doubt,  could  mankind  be  induced  to  avoid  the  appear- 
ance of  evil  through  a  becoming  fear  of  the  evil  itself,  or  by  a  dis- 
cerning and  wholesome  tone  of  public  sentiment ;  but  when  these 
are  wanting,  jealousy  may  serve  a  good  end,  even  when  that 
jealousy  is  far  from  being  pure  in  its  motives,  or  select  in  the 
means  which  it  employs.  Meanwhile,  the  virtuous  man  must  be 
deterred  from  the  evil  by  higher  principles,  and  be  on  his  guard 
against  countenancing  the  scandal,  even  when  he  sees  that  bene- 
ficial effects  may  be  produced  by  it. 

Another  subject  of  general  lamentation  is  the  evil  produced  by 
party  spirit  in  politics  and  religion.  Lord  Brougham,  in  a  well- 
known  passage,  supposes  all  the  statesmen  of  last  century  arranged 
before  us  as  in  a  picture-gallery,  and  a  stranger  coming  to  survey 
them.  "  Here,"  would  that  stranger  say,  "  stand  the  choicest 
spirits  of  their  age,  the  greatest  wits,  the  noblest  orators,  the  wisest 
politicians,  and  the  most  illustrious  patriots."  "Here  stand  all 
these  '  lights  of  the  world  and  demi-gods  of  fame  ;'  but  here  they 
ftand,  not .  ranged  on  one  side  of  this  gallery,  having  served  a 
common  country.  With  the  same  bright  object  in  view,  their 
efforts  were  divided,  not  united.  They  fiercely  combatted  with 
each  other,  and  did  not  together  assail  the  common  foe.  Their 
great  exertions  were  bestowed,  their  more  than  mortal  forces  were 
expended,  not  in  furthering  the  general  good,  not  in  resisting  their 
country's  enemies,  but  in  conflicts  among  themselves  ;  and  all 
their  triumphs  were  won  over  each  other,  and  all  their  sufferings 

*  Crabbe. 


432  INFLUENCE    EXERCISED    BY    THESE    PRINCIPLES 

were  endured  at  each  other's  hands."  The  Rev.  J.  A.  James 
quotes  this  passage,  and  adds,  that  the  stranger,  in  surveying  the 
portraits  of  our  theologians,  polemics,  authors,  and  preachers, 
would  be  compelled  to  endure  the  same  painful  surprise,  and  in- 
dulge in  the  same  sorrowful  reflections. 

And  no  one  should  allow  himself  to  palliate  this  spirit  proceed- 
ing from  the  most  selfish  and*  ungenerous  feelings  in  the  human 
breast.  Nor  is  any  one  entitled  to  affirm  that,  though  incidental 
good  has  arisen  from  it,  far  higher  good  would  not  have  sprung 
from  the  cherishing  of  an  opposite  spirit.  It  could  be  demonstrated, 
we  think,  that  the  spirit  of  love  would  have  produced  far  greater 
good  than  the  spirit  of  party,  and  this  a  good  unmixed  with  ac- 
companying evil.  Still,  we  must  shut  our  eyes  to  facts  which  are 
every  day  forcing  themselves  upon  our  notice,  if  we  deny  that  in 
the  existing  world  partizanship  in  politics,  and  sectarianism  in  re- 
ligion, have  been  made  to  serve  important  purposes  in  the  preven- 
tion of  evil,  and  the  instigation  of  what  is  positively  good.  But 
for  the  existence  of  such  a  spirit,  patriotism  would  often  have 
languished  and  died,  and  persons  in  possession  of  power  would 
have  been  allured  onward  to  acts  of  most  atrocious  tyranny.  The 
sifting  investigation  to  which  public  measures  are  subjected  arises 
sometimes  from  the  jealous  temper  with  which  parties  watch  each 
other  rather  than  from  disinterested  patriotism.  The  history  of 
the  Church  shows  how  activity  among  the  clergy,  and  a  spirit  of 
reading,  inquiry,  and  reflection,  among  the  great  mass  of  the 
people,  have  been  produced  and  fostered  by  the  clashing  of  oppo- 
sing sects,  when  deeper  principle  and  higher  feelings  might  have 
proved  utterly  ineffectual. 

SECTION   IV.— INFLUENCE    EXERCISED.  BY  THESE    PRINCIPLES   IN 
BIASING  THE  CONSCIENCE. 

The  attention  of  the  philosophic  mind  of  modern  Europe  was* 
first  called  to  the  class  of  phenomena  now  to  be  examined  by 
Hume,  more  particularly  in  his  famous  Dialogue  appended  to  the 
Treatise  on  Virtue.  The  train  of  observation  has  been  followed, 
too,  by  Adam  Smith,  in  his  Theory  of  Moral  Sentiments,  and  re- 
appears once  or  twice  in  his  Wealth  of  Nations.  It  is  prosecuted 
by  Macaulay,  with  his  usual  splendor  of  thought  and  diction,  in 
his  remarks  on  Macchiavelli,  and  is  fondly  dwelt  on  by  several 
ether  writers  of  our  age. 


IN    BIASING    THE    CONSCIENCE.  433 

We  may  first  take  a  view  of  the  phenomena  noticed  by  these 
acute  writers,  and  then  point  out  the  proper  use  to  be  made  of 
them.  In  this,  as  in  many  other  particulars,  Hume  has  been  guid- 
ing, in  a  manner  much  to  be  deplored,  the  thinking  mind  of  our 
countrymen.  It  is  needful  to  rectify  the  conclusions  rashly  drawn 
from  a  class  of  facts,  the  existence  of  which  cannot  be  denied. 

It  is  a  fact,  explain  it  as  we  please,  that  men's  moral  judgments 
are  swayed  by  the  supposed  beneficial  or  prejudicial  consequences 
of  actions.  The  mother  at  Athens  murdered  her  child  rather  than 
expose  it  through  life  to  poverty  and  growing  hardship.  The  In- 
dian drowns  his  mother  in  the  Ganges,  the  Caffre  exposes  her  by 
some  fountain,  and  justifies  his  conduct  on  the  ground  that  it  is 
better  she  should  thus  perish  than  drag  out  a  protracted  life  of 
misery.  The  Greeks  and  Romans  defended  the  practice  of  sui- 
cide, and  argued  that  life  should  terminate  when  it  ceases  to  be 
useful.  The  modern  gentleman  thinks  it  nothing  improper  to 
fight  a  duel,  and  tells  us  that  it  is  only  by  such  a  practice  that  a 
nice  sense  of  honor  can  be  maintained.  The  Frenchman  of  the 
days  of  Louis  XIV.  prided  himself  on  his  gay  and  gallant  be- 
havior, on  his  liberty  or  licentiousness,  as  necessary  to  the  produc- 
tion of  the  easy  and  lively  manners  which  prevailed  at  that  period. 

Dr.  Adam  Smith,  opening  up  another  vein  in  the  same  mine? 
has  shown  how  fortune,  utility,  custom,  and  fashion,  have  all  their 
influence  on  the  sentiments  of  approbation  and  disapprobation.* 
He  shows  how  the  "  effect  of  the  influence  of  fortune  is  first  to 
diminish  our  sense  of  the  merit  or  dement  of  those  actions  which 
arise  from  the  most  laudable  or  blamable  intentions,  when  they 
fail  of  producing  their  proposed  effects;  and  secondly,  to  increase 
our  sense  of  the  merit  or  demerit  of  actions  beyond  what  is  due  to 
the  motives  or  affections  from  which  they  proceed,  when  they  ac- 
cidentally give  occasion  either  to  pleasure  or  pain."  "  The  supe- 
riority of  virtues  and  talents  has  not,  even  upon  those  who 
acknowledge  that  superiority,  the  same  effect  as  the  superiority  of 
achievements."  "  The  agreeable  or  disagreeable  effects  of  actions 
often  throw  a  shadow  of  merit  or  demerit  upon  the  agent,  though 
in  his  intention  there  was  nothing  that  deserved  either  praise  or 
blame,  or  at  least  that  deserved  them  in  the  degree  in  which  we 
are  apt  to  bestow  them.  Thus,  even  the  messenger  of  bad  news 
is  disagreeable  to  us.  and  on  the  contrary  we  feel  a  sort  of  grati- 
tude to  the  man  who  brings  us  good  tidings."  He  shows  how 
*  See  Theory  of  Moral  Sentiments,  P.  ii.  sect.  iii.  P.  iv.  P.  v.  chap.  ii. 


434  INFLUENCE    EXERCISED    BY    THESE    PRINCIPLES 

custom  and  fashion  influence  our  moral' sentiments.  "  Those  who- 
have  been  educated  in  what  is  really  good  company,  not  what  is 
commonly  called  such,  who  have  been  accustomed  to  see  nothing 
ill  the  persons  whom  they  esteemed  and  lived  with,  but  justice, 
modesty,  humanity,  and  good  order,  are  more  shocked  with  what- 
ever seems  to  be  inconsistent  with  the  rules  which  these  virtues 
prescribe.  Those,  on  the  contrary,  who  have  had  the  misfortune 
to  be  brought  up  amidst  violence,  licentiousness,  falsehood,  and 
injustice,  lose,  though  not  all  sense  of  the  impropriety  of  such  con- 
duct, yet  all  sense  of  its  dreadful  enormity,  or  of  the  vengeance 
and  punishment  due  to  it."  "In  certain  ages,  as  in  those  of 
Charles  II.,  a  degree  of  licentiousness  was  associated  with  gene- 
rosity, sincerity,  magnanimity,  and  loyalty,  while  correctness  of 
demeanor  is  connected  with  cant,  cunning,  hypocrisy,  and  low 
manners.  Hence  the  vices  of  the  great  come  to  be  copied  as  as- 
sociated with  politeness,  elegance,  and  generosity.  From  this 
same  cause  proceed  those  requisitions  which  we  make  in  reference 
to  professional  character,  insisting  on  a  clergyman  that  he  be 
grave,  austere,  and  correct;  and  reckoning  the  spirit  and  bravery 
of  the  soldier  an  excuse  for  his  licentiousness  and  dissipation. 
The  relative  value  set  upon  virtues,  and  the  disapprobation  of 
vices,  among  different  classes  of  society,  all  proceed  from  the  same 
source.  Among  savages  and  barbarians,  hardiness  or  superiority 
to  fatigue  and  pain,  and  an  affected  indifference  to  the  softer  feel- 
ings and  sensibilities  of  the  heart,  as  they  are  among  the  most  useful, 
so  they  are  among  the  most  exalted  of  the  virtues.  In  civilized  soci- 
eties, on  the  other  hand,  the  virtues  of  humanity  are  more  respected, 
and  full  play  is  given  to  the  gentler  affections  of  the  heart.  Hence, 
too,  the  virtues  and  vices  that  are  characteristic  of  different  ranks  of 
life."  "  The  vices  of  levity  are  always  ruinous  to  the  common  peo- 
ple ;  and  a  single  week's  thoughtlessness  and  dissipation  is  often 
sufficient  to  ruin  a  poor  workman  forever,  and  to  drive  him,  through 
despair,  upon  committing  the  most  enormous  crimes.  The  wiser 
and  better  sort  of  common  people,  therefore,  have  always  the  utmost 
abhorrence  of  the  vices  of  levity  and  excess,  while  they  commend 
the  strict  and  austere  virtues.  On  the  other  hand,  among  the 
upper  classes,  luxury,  wanton  and  even  disorderly  mirth,  the  pur- 
suit of  pleasure  to  some  degree  of  intemperance,  the  breach  of 
chastity,  at  least  in  one  of  the  two  sexes,  &c.,  as  being  less  ruin 
ous,  are  treated  with  a  good  deal  of  indulgence."* 
*  Wealth  of  Nations,  Book  v.  chap,  i 


IN    BIASING    THE    CONSCIENCE.  435 

Mr.  Macaulay  has  avowedly  borrowed  from  the  Scotch  metaphy- 
sicians, and  has  used  their  observations  to  explain  the  different 
standards  of  character  found  among  different  nations.*  Among 
the  nations  north  of  the  Alps,  valor  was  absolutely  needful  in  order 
to  self-defence,  and  hence  courage  came  to  be  ranked  among  the 
highest  of  the  virtues,  and  was  supposed  to  excuse  ambition,  ra- 
pacity, and  cruelty,  while  cowardice  was  branded  with  the  foulest 
reproach ;  and  all  the  vices  belonging  to  timid  dispositions,  such 
as  fraud  and  hypocrisy,  hollow  friendship  and  violated  faith,  have 
been  objects  of  abhorrence.  Among  the  Italians,  on  the  other 
hand,  everything  was  done  by  superiority  of  intelligence ;  and 
they  came  to  regard  with  lenity  those  crimes  which  require  self- 
command,  address,  quick  observation,  fertile  invention,  and  pro- 
found knowledge  of  human  nature.  Much  the  same  difference 
seems  to  have  existed  between  the  Greeks  and  Romans  in  the 
asres  in  which  they  first  came  into  contact — and  hence  the  con- 

O  J 

tempt  which  each  felt  for  the  virtues  which  the  other  commended. 
"  Such,"  says  Mr.  Macaulay,  "  are  the  opposite  errors  which  men 
commit  when  their  morality  is  not  a  science  but  a  taste,  when 
they  abandon  eternal  principles  for  accidental  associations." 

We  perceive  that,  in  a  recent  work,  this  same  general  observa- 
tion is  employed  to  explain  and  excuse  the  quibbling  of  the  Greek 
sophists — it  was  as  useful,  the  author  thinks,  as  the  pleading  of 
modern  barristers ;  and  also  to  defend  that  understood  principle 
of  Greek  law,  which  required  the  accuser  in  a  criminal  case  to 
avow  that  he  was  actuated  by  personal  feeling — it  was,  it  seems, 
that  he  might  not  be  reckoned  an  officious  informer.t 

Such  is  the  train  of  observation  pursued  at  length  by  these 
writers,  very  much  to  the  disgust,  let  it  be  added,  of  many  ingenu- 
ous and  sincere,  though  perhaps  over-sensitive  minds,  who  feel  as 
if  the  remarks  offered  were  intended  to  rjalliate  sin,  and  remove 
the  landmarks  which  separate  vice  from  virtue.  In  consequence 
<Q\  the  use  which  has  thus  been  made  of  them,  many  have  turned 
away  with  as  much  loathing  as  George  III.  did  from  everything 
that  savors  of  Scotch  metaphysics. 

Still  it  cannot  be  doubted  that  the  above  are  real  phenomena. 
To  deny  them  is  to  refuse  to  hear  the  voice  of  history,  or  to  open 
our  eyes  on  the  scenes  which  are  constantly  pressing  themselves 
on  the  attention.  We  cannot  avoid  observing  them,  and,  as  we 

*  Macaulay's  Essays,  Macchiavelll 

f  See  Lewes'  Biographical  History  of  Philosophy. 


436  INFLUENCE    EXERCISED   BY   THESE    PRINCIPLES 

do  so,  let  us  endeavor  to  give  the  right  explanation,  and  rescue 
them  from  the  improper  use  made  of  them. 

Holding,  then,  as  we  do,  that  there  is  an  indelible  distinction  be- 
tween virtue  and  vice,  we  maintain  that  there  could  have  been  no 
such  perversions  of  the  moral  sense  in  a  mind  perfectly  pure  and 
spotless.  The  conscience  needs  only  to  be  enlightened  to  con- 
demn the  perversions  into  which  it  has  fallen  in  its  state  of  igno- 
rance. We  can  appeal  from  the.  conscience  misled  to  the  con- 
science rectified,  and  the  latter  will  announce  that  no  excuse  should 
be  offered  for  the  manner  in  which  it  has  been  perverted  under  the 
influence  of  sinful  and  blinding  prejudice. 

In  a  former  Chapter  we  have  pointed  out  the  way  in  which  the 
conscience  is  deluded.  A  concrete  fact  is  presented  under  a  par- 
tial aspect,  and  it  pronounces  its  judgment  according  to  the  repre- 
sentation made  to  it.  This  representation,  or  rather  misrepresen- 
tation, is  made,  directly  or  indirectly,  by  the  influence  of  a  rebel- 
lious will,  the  true  seat  of  all  moral  evil.  It  is  only  by  the  help  of 
such  a  principle  that  we  can,  on  the  one  hand,  uphold  the  recti- 
tude of  the  decisions  of  the  moral  faculty,  and,  on  the  other  hand, 
admit  that  in  fact  many  of  them  are  prejudiced  and  perverted. 

Now,  there  is  abundant  room  for  the  interference  of  the  preju- 
dices of  the  heart  in  the  representations  which  are  given  to  the 
conscience  of  our  own  actions  and  the  actions  of  our  neighbors, 
whenever  they  are  closely  connected  with  our  self-interest,  our 
favorite  habits,  our  social  and  sympathetic  and  benevolent  feelings. 
The  father,  unable  or  unwilling  to  support  the  child  who  is  yet 
beloved  of  him,  the  child  indisposed  to  expose  himself  to  privations 
on  account  of  his  aged  parents,  will  lend  his  ear  to  those  sugges- 
tions which  would  allure  him  to  commit  an  act  which,  when  re- 
garded under  a  particular  aspect,  may  seem  commendable,  but 
which  the  mind  would  utterly  abhor  if  viewed  under  all  its  aspects. 
That  it  is  really  such  a  prejudice  that  is  swaying  the  judgment  is 
evident  from  the  circumstance,  that  in  those  countries  in  which 
females  are  disparaged,  children  of  that  sex,  and  they  alone,  are 
in  the  way  of  being  exposed.  We  see,  too,  how  by  the  same 
peculiarity  of  our  nature,  fortune  and  utility  must  influence  the 
moral  judgments  of  the  mind.  The  fairer  features  of  actions  use- 
ful to  ourselves  or  others,  these  features,  and  these  alone,  are  pre- 
sented to  the  mind,  which  proceeds  in  consequence  to  applaud  the 
action.  Actions  which  are  in  themselves  vicious  come  to  be  popu- 
lar, and  regarded,  if  not  with  positive  commendation,  at  least  with- 


IN    BIASING    THE    CONSCIENCE. 

out  any  abhorrence,  because  associated  with  certain  pleasing  feel- 
ings or  beneficial  results  which  have  flowed  from  them.  All  this 
does  not  show,  as  Hume  would  argue,  that  virtue  consists  in  utility  ; 
it  merely  shows  that  a  strong-  feeling  of  utility,  like  a  strong 
feeling  of  passion,  may  influence  the  moral  faculty,  and  make  it 
pronounce  a  sentence  which  it  would  not  have  pronounced  had  it 
not  been  so  biased. 

But  reprobating,  as  we  ever  must,  these  perversions  of  our  moral 
nature  we,  cannot  shut  our  eyes  to  the  fact,  that  they  have  been 
overruled  in  many  cases,  so  as  to  bind  communities  together. 
Every  man  complains  of  the  influence  which  fortune,  and  even 
custom  and  fashion,  exercise  upon  the  moral  sentiments  ; — and  we 
would  not  complain  of  these  complaints.  They  originate  in  the 
moral  sense,  and  they  tend  most  effectually  to  check  a  flagrant  sin. 
But  while  the  influence  of  such  baser  considerations  upon  the  sen- 
timents which  should  be  elevated  far  above  them  is  in  itself  evil, 
every  one  may  observe  how  it  may  become  the  occasion  of  good. 
A  high  tone  of  moral  sentiment  in  a  community,  it  is  true,  might 
have  been  the  cause  of  infinitely  greater  good.  Still  the  good 
which  can  be  brought  out  of  that  which  is  in  itself  evil  is  patent  to 
observation.  Adam  Smith*  has  a  whole  chapter  on  the  final  cause 
of  that  irregularity  in  man's  nature,  by  which  fortune  comes  to 
influence  our  sentiments  of  approbation  and  disapprobation. 
"  Everybody  agrees  to  the  general  maxim,  that  as  the  event  does 
not  depend  on  the  agent,  it  ought  to  have  no  influence  upon  our 
sentiments  with  regard  to  the  merit  or  propriety  of  his  conduct. 
But  when  we  come  to  particulars,  we  find  that  our  sentiments  are 
scarce  in  one  instance  exactly  conformable  to  what  this  equitable 
maxim  would  direct"  This  very  irregularity,  he  proceeds  to  show, 
has  promoted  the  welfare  of  the  species ;  he  should  have  said,  in 
the  absence  of  higher  principle,  has  been  the  occasion  of  good. 
"  Man  must  not  be  satisfied  with  indolent  benevolence,  nor  fancy 
himself  the  friend  of  mankind  because  in  his  heart  he  wishes  well 
to  the  prosperity  of  the  world."  "Nature  has  taught  him  that 
neither  himself  nor  mankind  can  be  fully  satisfied  with  his  con- 
duct, nor  bestow  upon  it  the  full  measure  of  applause,  unless  he 
has  actually  produced  the  ends  which  it  is  the  purpose  of  his  being 
to  advance."  "  It  is  even  of  considerable  importance  that  the  evil 
which  is  done  without  design  should  be  regarded  as  a  misfortune 
lo  the  doer  as  well  as  the  sufferer."  "  As  in  the  ancient  heathen 
*  Moral  Sentiments,  P.  IL  sect.  id. 


438  INFLUENCE    EXERCISED    BY    THESE    PRINCIPLES 

religion,  that  holy  ground  which  had  been  consecrated  to  some 
god  was  not  to  be  trod  upon  but  upon  solemn  and  necessary  cc- 
casions,  and  the  man  who  had  even  ignorantly  violated  it  became 
piacular  from  that  moment,  and,  until  proper  atonement  should  be 
made,  incurred  the  vengeance  of  that  powerful  and  invisible  being 
to  whom  it  had  been  set  apart ;  so,  by  the  wisdom  of  nature,  the 
happiness  of  every  innocent  man  is  in  the  same  manner  rendered 
holy,  consecrated  round  about  against  the  approaches  of  every 
other  man,  not  to  be  wantonly  trod  upon,  not  even  to  be  in  any  respect 
ignorantly  and  involuntarily  violated,  without  requiring  some 
atonement  in  proportion  to  the  greatness  of  such  undesigned  vio- 
lation." 

From  the  same  irregularity,  or,  as  we  would  rather  call  it,  per- 
version of  sentiment,  there  proceeds  the  excessive  regard  that  is 
paid  by  certain  individuals,  or  by  certain  grades  of  society,  or  agesy 
or  nations,  to  certain  virtues  which  happen  to  chime  in  with  the 
prevailing  tastes,  or  to  be  immediately  subservient  to  the  interests 
of  the  parties.  Prudence,  outward  decency,  and  caution,  a  spirit 
of  frugality  and  industry,  come  to  be  commended  among  certain 
classes,  as  if  they  themselves  were  all  that  was  required  to  render 
the  possessor's  character  pleasing  in  the  sight  of  God  ;  while,  in 
other  grades  of  life,  a  spirit  of  liberality  and  courage  is  supposed 
to  make  atonement  for  every  vice.  Hence,  too,  the  popularity 
which  attaches  to  certain  qualities  which  are  evil  in  themselves, 
because  supposed  to  be  the  concomitants,  and  therefore  the  indica- 
tions, of  pleasing  or  useful  virtues.  Now,  while  we  cannot,  with- 
out partaking  of  the  sin,  commend  this  spirit,  we  may  observe  how 
it  has  been  the  great  means  of  fostering  the  temperance,  the 
frugality,  and  the  industry  which  so  distinguish  certain  walks  of 
life,  and  the  spirit  of  generosity  and  valor,  the  chivalry  and  romance 
and  heroism  which  have  been  so  beneficial  in  certain  stages  of 
society.  We  may  grieve  over  the  absence  of  higher  and  deeper 
principle  ;  but  we  cannot  help  admiring,  that  in  the  absence  of 
these  the  world  is  kept  from  sinking  into  in-tolerable  degradation, 
and  helped  forward  in  the  onward  march  of  civilization  by  evils 
being  made  to  counteract  prevailing  evils,  and  harmony  being  pro- 
duced by  notes  in  themselves  discordant. 

Having  resolved  these  phenomena  into  the  perversions  of  con- 
science, we  are  enabled  to  class  along  with  them,  and  under  the 
same  head,  those  superstitious  fears  which  have  exercised  so  ex- 
tensive a  power  upon  mankind.  A  superstitious  terror  has  been 


IN    BIASING    THE    CONSCIENCE.  439 

the  means  of  restraining  multitudes  from  crime,  when  love  to  God 
or  to  virtue  would  have  been  altogether  ineffectual.  Witches  and 
fairies,  ghosts  and  demons,  gods  and  goddesses,  the  penances  in- 
flicted by  the  priesthood  and  the  terrors  brought  from  the  invisible 
world,  (we  allude  of  course  to  superstitious  terrors,)  have  all  exer- 
cised a  power  in  keeping  back  mankind  from  deeds  which  would 
have  proved  injurious  to  society.  The  peopling  of  the  air,  the 
streams,  and  the  woods,  with  supernatural  beings,  and  of  the  dark- 
ness with  ghosts,  has  deterred  from  the  commission  of  crime  mul- 
titudes who  were  not  prepared  to  be  awed  by  the  thought  of  an 
omnipotent  God.  Every  one  knows  how  dangerous  it  is,  so  far 
as  the  peace  of  society  is  concerned,  to  remove  even  a  false  religion 
till  such  time  as  true  religion  has  taken  its  place ;  for,  in  rooting 
up  the  weed,  the  very  grain  may  be  torn  up  along  with  it.  All 
statesmen  have  now  come  to  see  that  man  cannot  do  without  a 
religion.  It  has  often  been  said  that  the  very  worst  governments 
are  better  than  no  government ;  and  a  precisely  analogous  maxim 
seems  now  to  be  adopted  in  regard  to  religion,  that  the  very  worst 
religions  are  better,  so  far  as  the  peace  of  society  is  concerned, 
than  none.  Legislators  have  thence  leapt  to  the  conclusion  that 
the  State  should  countenance  every  religion  ;  but  this  reasoning 
proceeds  on  the  perilous  view  that  virtue  consists  in  utility,  and 
that  virtues  and  vices  pass  into  each  other  by  insensible  gradations. 
A  higher  and  juster  view  of  the  nature  of  virtue,  and  of  the  essen- 
tial difference  between  it  and  vice,  would  lead  to  the  very  different 
conclusion  • — that  though  under  obligation  to  tolerate  a  religion 
believed  to  be  false,  we  were  not  at  liberty  directly  to  countenance 
it,  in  any  circumstances,  or  to  any  extent,  without  contracting  a 
far  greater  amount  of  guilt  than  those  who  sincerely,  though 
ignorantly,  are  the  votaries  of  that  mistaken  faith. 

Here  the  remark  is  forced  upon  us,  that  as  almost  all  changes 
for  good  in  society  have  been  produced  by  men  of  earnestness  and 
sincerity,  as  Carlyle  has  shown,  so  it  cannot  be  expected  of  the 
legislators  and  philosophers  of  the  utility  school,  that  they  should 
turn  out  to  be  the  most  effective  agents  in  promoting  the  utility 
which  they  profess  so  much  to  esteem.  Their  principles  will 
lead  them  to  admire  martyrs,  but  not  themselves  to  become  mar- 
tyrs ;  for  always  when  the  establishment  of  truth  seems  to  be 
impracticable,  they  will  be  tempted  to  yield  to  the  force  of  circum- 
stances. They  who  are  under  the  influence  of  principles  which 
do  not  change  with  changing  circumstances,  these  are  the  parties 


440  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

who  make  circumstances  to  bend  before  the  energy  of  their  will, 
and  who  produce  all  those  revolutions  in  opinion,  in  sentiment, 
and  in  action,  which  have  moved  onward  the  improvement  of 
mankind. 


SECTION  V.— ILLUSTRATIVE  NOTE  (F).— HUMAN  VIRTUES  (SO  CALLED) 
AND  VICES  RUNNING  -INTO  EACH  OTHER. 

"  There  is  not  on  earth,"  says  John  Foster,  "  a  more  capricious, 
accommodating,  or  abused  thing  than  conscience.  It  would  be 
very  possible  to  exhibit  a  curious  classification  of  consciences  in 
genera  and  species.  What  copious  matter  for  speculation  among 
the  varieties  of — the  lawyer's  conscience,  cleric  conscience,  lay 
conscience,  lords'  conscience,  peasants'  conscience,  hermits'  con- 
science, tradesmen's  conscience,  philosophers'  conscience,  Chris- 
tians' conscience,  conscience  of  reason,  conscience  of  faith,  healthy 
man's  conscience,  sick  man's  conscience,  ingenious  conscience, 
simple  conscience,  &C.1'* 

We  are  not  to  enter  into  this  wide  field  of  curious  and  dark, 
though  not  uninstructive  speculation.  Having  given  the  general 
theory  to  account  for  them,  we  take  up  merely  some  points  illus- 
trative of  man's  existing  state.  It  is  curious  to  observe  human 
virtues  so  represented  by  the  conscience,  and  human  vices  grow- 
ing on  the  same  root. 

The  modern  French  novelist  is  accustomed  to  exert  all  his 
startling  art,  in  exhibiting  the  growth  of  the  common  vices  under 
fostering  circumstances.  A  child,  who  never  knew  what  it  was 
to  be  warmed  by  human  affection,  is  placed  in  circumstances  in 
which  there  is  no  air  to  nourish  the  commonplace  virtues,  while 
there  is  a  feverish  encouragement  given  to  far  different  qualities. 
Living  in  the  contempt  of  the  ordinary  laws  of  morality,  the  child 
springs  up  into  a  bold,  heroic,  and  generous  youth,  and  does  acts 
which  command  our  admiration  ; — he  saves  the  life  of  another 
at  the  risk  of  his  own,  or  casts  his  protection  over  the  weak  and 
helpless.  No  doubt  he  has  a  bitter  antipathy  to  certain  individ- 
uals and  sections  of  the  community :  but  he  has  received  kind- 
ness from  none,  and  has  been  treated  with  cruel  scorn  and  injus- 
tice by  thousands.  What  claim  has  society  upon  him,  except  for 
his  revenge,  on  account  of  the  multiplied  injuries  inflicted  upon 
him.  His  virtues,  set  off  by  the  meretricious  art  of  the  writer,  are 

*  Memoirs. 


VIRTUES    AND    VICES    RUNNING    INTO    EACH    OTHER.       441 

all  his  own ;  while  his  vices,  his  fights,  his  robberies,  his  very 
murders  can  be  fairly  charged  upon  the  community,  rather  than 
upon  himself  individually,  and  are  relieved  by  the  gallantry  and 
generosity  of  spirit  displayed  in  the  very  perpetration  of  them. 

Or  it  is  a  lady  of  extreme  beauty  and  sensibility  that  is  made 
to  flit  before  our  vision  ;  and  we  see  her  sacrificed  to  family 
pride  or  avarice,  and  bound  to  a  husband  whom  she  cannot  love. 
An  attachment  springs  up  involuntarily  in  her  breast  towards  a 
youth  of  daring  courage  and  the  gentlest  generosity,  who  comes 
accidentally  in  her  way,  and  reciprocates  her  affection.  Resolu- 
tions are  formed  by  the  parties,  and  struggles  made,  with  a  view 
of  eradicating  the  attachment,  only  to  be  baffled  by  untoward  cir- 
cumstances, and  cruel  usage  is  inflicted  on  the  parties  suspected 
while  yet  innocent,  till  they  are  led  or  driven  to  an  intercourse, 
which  the  author  tells  us,  the  world  in  its  uncharitableness  con- 
demns, but  condemns  in  utter  ignorance  of  the  circumstances,  and 
which  may  be  regarded  as  being  hallowed,  as  well  as  sweetened, 
by  the  spirit  of  devotedness  and  self-sacrifice  with  which  it  is 
characterized. 

The  healthier  English  mind  recoils  from  such  a  picture  with 
a  just  abhorrence  ;  and  reprobates  the  literature  in  which  vice  is 
so  painted  as  to  be  admired.  But  this  same  boastful  English 
spirit  overflows  with  feelings  of  admiration  towards  a  different,  and 
it  is  supposed,  a  more  perfect  picture.  We  have  an  attractive  view 
of  the  country  squire, — warm-hearted,  honest,  kind  to  his  ten- 
antry, liberal  in  supplying  the  wants  of  the  poor,  and  sticking  fast 
to  his  political  party ;  and  though  it  is  not  denied,  but  rather 
avowed  with  self-complacent  candor,  that  he  is  given  at  times  to 
excess  in  drinking,  that  he  swears  when  in  a  passion,  that  at  least 
he  has  no  respect  to  God  in  his  conduct,  or  humble  submission 
of  heart  before  his  heavenly  Governor, — we  are  made  to  forget, 
or  justify  all  this,  in  our  admiration  of  his  bluff  integrity  and 
disinterested  charity.  Or  it  is  the  British  merchant  that  is 
brought  before  us  in  the  market-place,  open-hearted  and  open- 
handed  ;  or  the  English  yeoman  in  his  sequestered  cottage,  in- 
dustrious, respectful  to  his  superiors,  and  attached  to  the  ancient 
heads  of  his  house ;  but  both  the  one  and  the  other,  it  is  acknowl- 
edged without  shame,  if  not  with  pride,  are  notoriously  not  given 
to  penitence  for  sin,  or  to  express  love  to  God  which  they  do  not 
feel ;  nay,  it  is  not  concealed  that  they  are  at  times  addicted  to 
profanity  and  gross  neglect  of  sacred  duties,  and  yet  we  are  made 


442  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

to  admire  none  the  less,  but  all  the  more,  this  worldl)  morality, 
because  it  is  not  rendered  offensive  by  religion. 

Truly  our  popular  novels  give  us  a  correct  picture  of  human 
nature  ;  but  not  in  the  way  in  which  their  advocates  would  have 
it.  They  give  us  a  picture,  not  of  the  world  as  it  is,  but  of  the 
world,  as  the  world  supposes  itself  to  be.  The  skilful  eye  may 
see,  by  a  deeper  skill,  in  the  skilful- novel  the  tricks  to  which  man- 
kind resort  to  disguise  their  true  characters  from  themselves,  and 
deck  them  in  an  assumed  character. 

If  the  question  related  to  the  relative  superiority  of  the  French- 
man's or  Englishman's  feeling,  we  would  have  no  hesitation  in 
giving  the  preference  to  the  latter  as  the  healthier ;  but  the  ques- 
tion rather  is,  Is  the  feeling  of  the  one  or  the  other  what  it  ought 
to  be  ?  The  Englishman  condemns,  and  very  properly  condemns, 
the  picture  drawn  by  the  Frenchman.  But  can  you  deny,  says 
the  Frenchman,  that  the  tenderness,  the  sympathy,  the  devoted- 
ness  of  my  hero  and  heroine  are  commendable  ?  No,  says  the  Eng- 
lishman ;  but  we  are  not  accustomed  to  think  in  our  country  that 
fine  sentiment  excuses  open  immorality.  But  the  Englishman  is 
too  blunt  and  self-confident  to  perceive,  that  it  is  with  the  same 
weapons  that  he  defends  himself  when  attacked.  Do  you  not, 
says  he,  commend  this  sterling  honesty  and  openness  of  char- 
acter? Most  assuredly  we  do,  more  than  the  fine  sentimentality 
of  the  Frenchman  ;  but  feel  all  the  while,  that  if  fine  sentiment 
cannot  excuse  immorality,  just  as  little  can  an  earthly  morality 
excuse  an  acknowledged  ungodliness.  That  there  is  truth  in  the 
one  picture  as  in  the  other — in  the  Frenchman's,  as  in  the  Eng- 
lishman's— we  frankly  admit.  We  would  not  dispute  the  co- 
existence at  times  of  genuine  feeling  and  purposes  of  heroism  in  the 
heart  that  plans  robbery  and  adultery.  We  believe  that  there 
may  be  the  exercise  of  sterling  honesty,  and  large  liberality,  and 
devoted  attachment  in  peer  and  peasant,  in  merchant  and  me- 
chanic, altogether  unaccompanied  with  faith  in  God,  or  a  sense 
of  dependence  on  him.  But  just  as  the  Englishman  sets  little 
value  on  the  Frenchman's  flowing  sensibilities,  cherished  in  con- 
tempt of  the  laws  of  morality  ;  so  we  believe  that  the  man  whose 
conscience  is  on  the  proper  balance,  and  weighing  all  things  in 
equal  scales,  will  not  allow  himself  to  be  hurried  along  by  a  blind 
admiration  of  mere  instinctive  qualities,  which  either  have  no  re- 
spect to  God,  or  set  God  at  open  defiance. 

We  must  rise  to  a  higher  elevation,  and  seek  to  breathe  a  purer 


VIRTUES    AND    VICES    RUNNING    INTO   EACH    OTHER.       443 

atmosphere  than  either.  We  have  in  the  one  as  in  the  other  a 
misguided  conscience  swayed  by  national  predilections,  looking 
only  at  certain  features  of  human  actions,  and  overlooking  others. 
The  Englishman,  in  reading  the  Frenchman's  tale,  does  not  feel 
himself  at  liberty  in  his  admiration  of  romantic  adventure,  delicate 
sensibility,  and  devoted  attachment,  to  wink  at  robbery,  murder, 
and  adultery.  But  we  maintain  that  if  the  Englishman's  stand- 
ard were  a  little  higher,  as  high  as  it  ought  to  be,  he  would  not 
be  able  in  his  admiration  of  bluntness,  and  honesty,  and  good 
nature,  to  forget  that  these  qualities  cannot  make  atonement  for 
the  absence  of  a  heart  rightly  disposed  towards  God;  and  he 
would  condemn,  not  only  the  Frenchman's  attempt  to  cheat  us 
out  of  our  morality  by  a  theatrical  exhibition  of  sensibility,  but 
the  Englishman's  attempt  to  cheat  us  out  of  our  reverence  for 
piety,  by  the  attractive  and  possibly  far  from  faithful  picture  given 
of  a  godless  morality. 

Let  us  mark  how  human  virtues  and  human  vices  ever  slide 
into  each  other,  and  are  not  separated  as  true  virtue  must  ever  be 
from  vice  by  a  distinct  line  of  demarcation.  We  find,  on  anato- 
mizing the  characters  of  great  men,  who  have  also  been  bad  men, 
that  their  noble  qualities  are  woven  like  woof  and  weft  with  those 
that  are  baser,  in  such  a  way  that  the  two  cannot  be  separated. 
The  pride  and  self-assurance  and  passion  of  Robert  Burns  were 
indissolubly  connected  with  that  noble  manliness  and  independence 
of  spirit  which  he  delights  to  display.  Rousseau's  exquisite  senti- 
ment, and  his  morbid  jealousy  and  addictedness  to  sensuality  were 
associated  together  in  his  fine,  but  effeminate  and  diseased  temper- 
ament. No  man  can  separate  Byron's  thoughts,  often  so  grand 
and  yet  so  wild  and  loose,  from  his  previous  history,  his  early  vices, 
his  precocious  lusts  and  passions,  with  a  conscience,  roused  into 
activity  by  the  open  nature  of  the  rebellion  against  it,  kicking 
against  them.  We  think  it  should  be  admitted  in  all  these  cases 
that  we  could  not  have  had  the  one  set  of  qualities  without  the 
other — the  genius  and  feeling  in  the  particular  form  without  the 
previous  history,  the  disordered  temperament,  and  the  melancholy 
experience.  We  could  not  have  had  these  throes,  so  indicative  of 
strength,  without  the  accompanying  fever.  Just  as  the  wound  in 
the  body  helped  Harvey  to  discover  the  circulation  of  the  blood ; 
so  it  has  been  the  rent  in  these  men's  nature  that  has  enabled  us 
to  look  into  the  living  movements  of  their  hearts.  Are  we  there- 
fore to  palliate  the  vice,  because  of  its  connection  with  the  proper- 


444  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

ties  which  we  are  constrained  to  admire?  No,  it  were  vastly 
more  becoming  to  suspect  the  virtues  that  have  sprung  from  so 
dubious  a  source ;  no,  not  to  condemn  the  virtues,  but  to  condemn 
the  agent  in  his  supposed  virtues,  as  well  as  in  his  vices ;  because 
the  elements  of  which  the  one  is  composed,  are  about  as  base  as 
the  elements  of  the  other. 

Proceeding  on  the  idea,  that  what  are  commonly  called  virtues, 
are  real  virtues,  we  should  find  that  no  line  can  be  drawn  to  divide 
them  from  contiguous  vices  ;  and  Hume  is  right  in  saying,  "  All 
kinds  of  vice  and  virtue  run  insensibly  into  each  other,  and  may 
approach  by  such  imperceptible  degrees,  as  will  make  it  very  diffi- 
cult, if  not  absolutely  impossible,  to  determine  where  the  one  ends 
and  the  other  begins."  *  It  might  easily  be  shown  how,  out  of  the 
same  elements  of  our  nature,  there  may  be  produced  avarice,  as 
well  as  industry — malice,  as  well  as  what  is  called  spirit — vanity, 
as  well  as  amiability — cowardice,  as  well  as  caution.  One  man 
is  a  great  hero,  another  is  a  great  criminal ;  if  they  had  but  ex- 
changed places,  they  had  also  exchanged  characters.  Take  the 
common  ideas  of  virtue,  and  we  shall  speedily  find  that  the  differ- 
ence between  virtue  and  vice  is  one  of  circumstance,  rather  than 
nature — of  degree,  rather  than  of  kind.  What  was  esteemed  as 
vice  in  one  rank  of  life,  would  require  to  be  regarded  as  virtue  in 
another.  Proceeding  on  the  views  of  the  world,  and  carrying 
them  to  their  legitimate  conclusion,  we  shall  find  moral  distinc- 
tions effaced,  and  all  defined  ideas  deranged  and  confounded.  Let 
us  learn,  then,  to  draw  back  before  we  reach  such  a  result,  and 
examine  the  stability  of  the  ground  on  which  the  common  notions 
are  built.  If,  it  be  true  that  certain  vices  spring  from  the  same 
root,  as  what  are  supposed  to  be  virtues,  it  is  worthy  of  inquiry 
whether  these  supposed  virtues  are  to  be  regarded  as  virtues 
at  all. 

Every  observer  of  human  nature  will  admit,  that  the  person  of 
most  correct  demeanor  might  under  a  different  training,  but  with 
the  same  internal  principles,  have  fallen  into  not  a  few  acknowl- 
edged vices.  This  person  has  been  kept  right,  merely  in  conse- 
quence of  a  way  being  hedged  in  for  him,  and  by  the  operation  of 
instincts  in  which  there  is  nothing  truly  virtuous ;  and  in  another 
position,  these  very  instincts  might  have  hurried  the  possessor  into 
open  crime.  Are  we  therefore  to  excuse  the  crime  on  the  part  of 
those  who  commit  it  ?  No,  assuredly ;  but  we  are  to  make  a 
*  Morals,  P.  ii.  sect.  vi. 


ARGUMENT    FROM    THE    PHYSICAL    AND    MORAL.  445 

searching  inquiry  into  our  mere  outward  decorum,  lest  it  should 
turn  out  to  be  founded  on  principles  and  originating  in  motives 
which  are  no  way  morally  commendable.  Let  us  anticipate  in 
this  matter  the  day  of  judgment,  where  there  will  be  "  innume- 
rable false  and  imaginary  virtues,  which  will  involve  their  posses- 
sors in  deeper  disgrace  than  vices  themselves  when  acknowledged 
and  deplored."* 


SECTION  V.-^UMMARY  OF  THE  ARGUMENT  FROM  THE  COMBINED 
VIEW  OF  THE  PHYSICAL  AND  THE  MORAL. 

In  astronomy,  the  distance  of  a  star  is  determined  by  surveying 
it  from  two  points.  There  are  heavenly  truths  which  are  best 
ascertained  by  taking  two  positions,  and  a  view  from  each.  It  is 
from  a  consideration,  both  of  the  physical  and  the  moral,  that  we 
obtain  the  proper  measure  of  the  Divine  administration. 

We  cannot,  from  the  physical  alone,  determine  what  God  and 
this  world  are  in  their  relation  to  one  another.  Considered  in 
itself,  the  physical  does  seem  as  if  it  was  constituted,  so  as  to 
be  restrictive  of  human  folly  and  punitive  of  human  wickedness. 
But  the  argument  is  far  from  being  complete,  till  we  demonstrate, 
on  independent  grounds,  that  human  folly  and  human  wickedness 
exist.  We  have  throughout  the  whole  of  this  Treatise  proceeded 
on  the  principle  that  we  cannot  connect  the  facts  till  the  separate 
existence  of  each  has  been  ascertained  on  satisfactory  grounds. 
By  a  preliminary  examination  of  .the  Physical,  it  may  be  shown 
to  be  fitted  to  promote  such  and  such  ends ;  but  the  complement 
of  the  argument  is  derived  from  the  consideration  of  the  Moral, 
which  shows  that  there  are  such  ends  to  be  served. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  does  not  appear,  that  from  a  consideration 
of  the  moral,  considered  separately,  we  could  readily  take  a  proper 
measure  of  the  relation  of  God  and  the  world.  The  internal  feel- 
ings would  be  apt  to  be  disregarded  by  mankind,  so  inclined  to 
look  to  the  world  without  instead  of  the  world  within,  and  would 
certainly  be  misinterpreted,  but  for  the  confirmation  furnished  by 
the  visible  dispensations  of  Divine  Providence.  As  the  physical 
requires  the  moral,  so  the  moral  requires  the  physical,  as  its  com- 
plement in  giving  a  full  exhibition  of  the  character  of  God,  and 
of  his  administration  in  reference  to  our  world. 

We  have  failed  of  the  object  which  we  had  in  view,  if  we  have 

*  Bourdaloue. 


446      ARGUMENT  PROM  THE  PHYSICAL  AND  MORAL. 

not  shown  that  the  two,  the  physical  and  the  moral,  are  in  com- 
plete harmony — a  harmony  implying,  however,  that  man  has 
fallen,  that  God  is  restraining  while  he  blesses  him,  and  showing 
His  displeasure  at  sin,  while  He  is  seeking  to  gain  the  heart  of 
the  sinner.  Leave  out  any  one  of  these  elements,  and  to  us  the 
world  would  appear  an  inexplicable  enigma.  Take  these  truths 
with  us,  and  there  is  sufficient  light  struck  up  to  show.,  that  if  we 
had  but  farther  light,  every  myste'ry  might  be  explained  ;  and  we 
feel  that  this  farther  light  may  be  denied  us,  just  because  of  the 
probationary  state  in  which,  according  to  these  truths,  we  are 
placed.  There  is  thus  introduced  a  consistency  into  the  whole, 
including  even  the  seeming  inconsistencies  which,  if  we  cannot 
clear  up,  we  can  at  least  account  for. 


METHOD  OF  THE  DIVINE  GOVERNMENT, 


BOOK  FOURTH. 

RESULTS—THE  RECONCILIATION  OF  GOD  AND  MAN. 


CHAPTER  I. 

NATURAL  AND  REVEALED  RELIGION—THE  CHARACTER  OF 

GOD. 

SECTION  I.— ADVANTAGE  OF  HARMONIZING  NATURE  AND 
REVELATION. 

AT  the  close  of  our  extensive  survey,  it  may  be  useful  to  collect 
into  a  few  heads  the  results  which  we  have  been  able  to  gather 
in  our  progress.  If  in  the  discussions  in  which  we  engaged  in 
the  first  Book,  we  felt  ourselves  merely  as  it  were  in  the  vesti- 
bule ;  we  now,  after  having  passed  through  the  temple,  feel  our- 
selves to  be  entering  the  chancel,  the  holiest  of  all.  Here  we 
would  seek  to  have  God  himself  communing  with  us  in  a  super- 
natural way,  to  clear  up  doubts  and  mysteries.  "  When  I  thought 
to  know  this,  it  was  labor  in  mine  eyes,  until  I  went  into  the 
sanctuary." 

One  of  the  objects  contemplated  in  this  Treatise  has  been  the 
spiritualizing  of  nature,  which  has  been  so  carnalized  by  many, 
and  in  sanctifying  it,  to  bring  it  into  communion  with  religion. 

We  have  often  mourned  over  the  attempts  made  to  set  the 
works  against  the  word  of  God,  and  thereby  excite,  propagate, 
and  perpetuate  jealousies,  fitted  to  separate  parties  that  ought  to 
live  in  closest  union.  In  particular,  we  have  always  regretUd 


448  ADVANTAGE    OF    HARMONIZING 

that  endeavors  should  be  made  to  depreciate  nature,  with  the  view 
of  exalting  revelation  ;  it  has  always  appeared  to  us  to  be  nothing 
else  than  the  degrading  of  one  part  of  God's  works,  in  the  hope 
thereby  of  exalting  and  recommending  another.  It  is  at  all  times 
perilous  on  the  part  of  the  votaries,  whether  of  science  or  religion, 
to  set  the  branches  of  knowledge  which  they  severally  prosecute 
against  each  other.  On  the  one  hand,  science  cannot  accomplish 
ends  truly  beneficent,  if  it  make  an  idol  of  the  works  of  God,  and, 
Parsee-like,  worship  the  sun  and  moon  and  elements  of  nature ; 
and  religion,  on  the  other  hand,  is  unnecessarily  raising  preju- 
dices against  itself,  and  is  truly  dishonoring  God — while  it  may 
profess  to  honor  him — when  it  would  discourage  inquiry  into 
those  works  of  God  which  he  has  spread  around  us,  which  are 
manifestly  inviting  us  to  look  at  and  admire  them,  and  rewarding 
us  by  a  thousand  discoveries,  when  we  treat  them  as  we  ought 
to  treat  God's  works,  and  investigate  them  with  patience  and  with 
reverence. 

Perilous  as  it  is  at  all  times  for  the  friends  of  religion  to  set 
themselves  against  natural  science,  it  is  especially  dangerous  in 
an  age  like  the  present.  We  live  afra  time  when  all  our  educated 
youth  are  instructed  in  the  elements  of  natural  science,  as  well  as 
in  the  more  sacred  doctrines  of  theology.  We  fear  that  there  are 
many  who  know  not  how  to  reconcile  the  two  faiths  in  which 
they  have  been  educated.  Meanwhile  studious  attempts  are  being 
made  to  show  that  Christianity  cannot  stand  the  light  of  the  age 
in  which  we  live.  The  impression  left  is  very  painful  when  the 
mind  imagines  that  it  discovers  a  discrepancy  between  two  de- 
partments of  knowledge  in  which  it  has  been  trained,  as  painful 
as  if  one  were  to  hear  it  reported  of  a  revered  friend,  a  parent,  or 
brother,  that  he  had  committed  a  dishonorable  or  criminal  action. 
Thousands  have  felt  in  this  way,  and  thousands  are  at  this  pres- 
ent time  so  feeling  as  they  turn  from  secular  books  of  science  to 
the  Bible,  and  when  they  enter  our  upper  schools  and  mechanics' 
institutions  and  colleges.  The  heart  of  many  a  youth  of  promise 
has  been  wrung,  till  feelings  more  bitter  than  tears  have  burst 
from  it,  as  he  stood  by  the  chasm  over  which  no  bridge  seemed  to 
be  thrown.  A  dark  cloud  of  doubt  arising  from  that  gulf  has 
brooded  over  and  settled  upon  many  a  mind,  and  has  produced 
the  same  effects  as  a  wet  and  cloudy  atmosphere  upon  the  body, 
damping  by  its  moist  and  heavy  influence  all  generous  confidence, 
all  zeal  and  enthusiasm.  Others,  abandoning  religion  as  laying 


NATURE    AND    REVELATION.  449 

restraints  upon  them  to  which  they  were  not  willing  to  yield,  have 
betaken  themselves  to  the  splendid  but  uninhabited  halls  of  sci- 
ence, and  wander  through  them  in  wonder  and  admiration,  but 
without  ever  rinding,  or  so  much  as  looking  for  a  governor  to  rule 
or  a  teacher  to  instruct,  a  friend  to  comfort  or  a  mediator  to  inter- 
cede for  them.* 

It  is  no  profane  work  that  is  engaged  in  by  those,  who  in  all 
humility  would  endeavor  to  remove  jealousies  between  parties 
whom  God  has  joined  together,  and  whom  man  is  not  at  liberty 
to  put  asunder.  We  are  not  lowering  the  dignity  of  science  when 
we  command  it  to  do  what  all  the  object^  which  it  looks  at  and 
admires  do,  when  we  command  it  to  worship  God.  Nor  are  we 
detracting  from  the  honor  which  is  due  to  religion  when  we  press 
it  to  take  science  into  its  service,  and  accept  the  homage  which  it 
is  able  to  pay.  We  are  seeking  to  exalt  both  when  we  show  how 
nature  conducts  us  to  the  threshold  of  religion,  and  when  from 
this  point  we  bid  you  look  abroad  on  the  wide  territories  of  nature. 
We  would  aid  religion  and  science,  at  the  same  time,  by  removing 
those  prejudices  against  sacred  truth,  which  nature  has  been  em- 
ployed to  foster ;  and  we  would  accomplish  this,  not  by  casting 
aside  and  discarding  nature,  but  by  rightly  interpreting  it. 

Let  not  science  and  religion  be  reckoned  as  opposing  citadels, 
frowning  defiance  upon  each  other,  and  their  troops  brandishing 
their  armor  in  hostile  attitude.  They  have  too  many  common 
foes,  if  they  would  but  think  of  it,  in  ignorance  and  prejudice,  in 
passion  and  vice,  under  all  their  forms,  to  admit  of  their  lawfully 
wasting  their  strength  in  a  useless  warfare  with  each  other.  Sci- 
ence has  a  foundation,  and  so  has  religion  ;  let  them  unite  their 
foundations,  and  the  basis  will  be  broader,  and  they  will  be  two 
compartments  of  one  great  fabric  reared  to  the  glory  of  God.  Let 
the  one  be  the  outer  and  the  other  the  inner  court.  In  the  one 
let  all  look,  and  admire,  and  adore,  and  in  the  other  let  those  who 
have  faith  kneel,  and  pray,  and  praise.  Let  the  one  be  the  sanc- 
tuary where  human  learning  may  present  its  richest  incense  as 
an  offering  to  God,  and  the  other,  the  holiest  of  all,  separated 
from  it  by  a  veil  now  rent  in  twain,  and  in  which,  on  a  blood- 
sprinkled  mercy-seat,  we  pour  out  the  love  of  a  reconciled  heart, 
and  hear  the  oracles  of  the  living  God. 

In  the  foregoing  discussions  we  have  studiously  and  systemati- 

*  See  a  very  melancholy  picture  of  the  experience  of  Jouflfroy  in  his  "  Melanges 
Nouvelles." 

29 


450  ADVANTAGE    OF   HARMONIZING 

cally  avoided  the  direct  introduction  of  Scripture,  and  this  for 
several  reasons.  First  of  all,  we  did  not  wish  to  identify  Scripture 
with  all  our  speculations,  which  must  stand  or  fall  according  to 
the  evidence  adduced.  Augustine  has  uttered  a  proper  warning 
against  the  identifying  of  Scripture  and  human  dogmatism,  "  lest% 
when  a  more  thorough  discussion  has  shown  the  opinion  which 
we  had  adopted  to  be  false,  our  faith  may  fall  with  it,  and  we 
should  be  found  contending,  not  for  the  doctrines  of  the  sacred 
Scriptures,  but  for  our  own  attempts  to  make  our  doctrine  that 
of  the  Scriptures,  instead  of  taking  the  doctrine  of  Scripture  to  be 
ours."  We  wished  to  avoid  rendering  ourselves  liable  to  the  re- 
"  buke  of  Bacon  in  that  well-known  passage  in  which  he  remon- 
strates with  those  who  seek  philosophy  in  the  Scriptures,  which 
he  describes  as  seeking  the  dead  among  the  living — as  the  seeking 
of  religion  in  philosophy  is  the  seeking  of  the  living  among  the 
dead.  "  And  this  folly,"  he  adds,  "  is  the  more  to  be  prevented 
and  restrained,  because  not  only  fantastical  philosophy,  but  heret- 
ical religion,  spring  from  the  absurd  mixture  of  things  divine  and 
human.  It  is  therefore  the  wisest  soberly  to  render  unto  faith  the 
things  that  are  faith's."*  Such  weighty  considerations  have  led 
us  to  separate  between  our  own  ratiocinations  and  the  dicta  of  the 
infallible  word.  We  were  resolved,  that  if  we  could  not  bring  any 
contributions  to  religion,  we  would  at  least  keep  from  injuring  it 
by  making  our  views  and  opinions  lean  upon  it. 

We  have  had  another  object  in  view.  We  wished  to  contribute 
a  quota  of  evidence  to  the  support  of  the  Divine  Original  of  the 
Scriptures.  We  were  anxious  to  show  that  nature,  rightly  inter- 
preted, so  far  from  setting  itself  against  Christianity,  furnishes 
not  a  little  to  favor  it,  and  that  both  give  the  same  views  of  the 
character  and  government  of  God,  and  of  the  nature  and  destiny 
of  man.  But  in  order  to  lend  such  a  support,  however  feeble,  to 
revelation,  it  is  evident  that  the  prop  must  be  built  upon  an  inde- 
pendent basis.  We  have  sought  for  such  a  basis,  and  have  found 
it,  as  we  conceive,  in  the  government  of  God,  as  seen  in  His  works 
properly  comprehended. 

Nor  are  we  bound  to  prove,  in  order  to  the  use  of  this  argument, 
that  the  human  mind  could  have  discovered  all  these  doctrines  by 
its  own  native  force.  It  may  be  doubted  whether,  without  the 
positive  declarations  of  inspiration,  we  could  have  discovered  the 
mine  in  which  we  have  been  digging ;  but  this  is  no  reason  why 

*  Novum  Organum. 


NATURE  AND  REVELATION.  451 

We  should  not  employ  the  wealth  which  has  been  found  there  in 
supporting  the  cause  of  Him  who  has  conducted  us  to  it.  Such 
cases  of  action  and  reaction  in  evidence  occur  in  every  department 
of  inquiry.  The  question  is  not,  whether  these  views  could  have 
been  discovered  by  unaided  reason  ;  but  the  question  is, — Now, 
When  reason  has  been  aided,  does  it  not  give  its  sanction  to  the 
doctrines  which  we  have  been  expounding  ?  Without  the  tele- 
scope we  would  not  have  been  able  to  discover  a  multitude  of  the 
heavenly  bodies  BOW  open  to  our  observation  thus  assisted  ;  yet  it 
is  by  these  very  heavenly  bodies  that  the  astronomer  tries  and 
tests  his  instruments.  The  prop  deiived  from  the  interpretation 
of  God's  works  may  be  a  support,  provided  always  it  has  a  sep- 
arate basis,  though  it  partially  lean  on  the  object  supported, 

And  hence  we  are  at  perfect  liberty,  and  in  consistency  with  all 
that  we  have  been  urging,  to  agree  with  such  writers  as  Halybur- 
ton  in  his  work  on  the  necessity  of  revealed  religioa,  when  he 
shows  the  importance  of  revelation  in  clearing  up  the  doubts  that 
press  upon  and  weigh  down  the  human  spirit.  We  may  acknowl- 
edge the  necessity  of  a  light  from  heaven  to  enable  us  to  explore 
-he  territory  which  we  have  been  exploring  ;  but  from  that  terri- 
tory we  may  look  up  with  gratitude  to  the  light  which  has  guided 
us,  and  every  new  discovery  made  may  demonstrate  that  the  light 
is  truly  a  light  from  heaven.  Our  argument  is  not  the  moving  in 
a  circle,  but  the  reflection  of  light  back  upon  the  body  from  which 
it  has  come, 

We  are  entitled,  then,  to  urge  the  analogy  or  correspondence 
between  natural  and  revealed  religion  as  an  argument  in  behalf 
of  the  latter.  The  phenomena  to  which  the  attention  has  been 
called  are  facts,  and  they  establish  the  very  doctrines  revealed  in 
Scripture.  Other  explanations,  we  are  aware,  may  be  given,  and 
have  been  given,  of  some  of  these  phenomena  ;  but  we  hold  that 
the  explanation  which  we  have  given  is  the  only  satisfactory  ex- 
planation. Even  though  it  were  regarded  only  as  accounting  for 
them  better  than  any  other,  or  as  well  as  any  other,  still  the  argu- 
ment would  not  be  without  its  force.  Taking  even  the  low  view- 
that  the  Scriptures  can  enable  us  to  explain  some  of  the  mysteries 
of  the  Divine  government— or  lower  still,  supposing  thai  the  darker 
phenomena  of  nature  admit  of  an  explanation  agreeably  to  the 
Divine  word,  we  would  find  even  then  a  reflex  contribution  to  the 
word  which  has  furnished  us  with  such  a  key. 

Apart  altogether  from  the  evidence  in  behalf  of  the  Divine 


452  PREVAILING    DEFECTIVE    VIEWS    OF 

origin  of  the  Scriptures,  we  have  obtained,  as  it  appears  to  us,  mairy 
instructive  and  pleasing  views  of  the  ways  of  God,  and  humbling 
yet  exalted,  views  of  the  character  of  man.  We  have  entered 
fields  into  which  the  inspired  writers  do  not  carry  us,  and  in  them 
we  have  gathered  instruction  in  unison  with  the  letter  and  spirit 
of  the  word,  and  fitted  to  enable  the  reflecting  mind  to  make  a 
Christian  use  of  modern  philosophy.  If  it  is  the  will  of  God  that 
men  should  use  their  lofty  faculties  in  investigating  the  works  of 
nature,  it  is  surely  his  will  that  they  should  employ  them  in  con- 
necting the  truths  of  nature  with  the  truths  of  revelation.  From 
these  high  truths  of  natural  religion,  all  cold  and  distant  though 
they  may  appear,  we  believe  that  the  thoughtful  mind  may  derive 
much  to  refresh  and  quicken  its  faith,  as  the  snow-covered  moun- 
tains send  forth  their  streams  to  water  the  thirsty  plains  of  torrid 
climates. 

SECTION  IL— PREVAILING  DEFECTIVE  VIEWS  OF  THE  DIVINE 
CHARACTER. 

There  have  been  ages  in  the  history  of  the  world  in  which  it 
might  have  been  more  needful  to  bring  into  prominence  what  are 
commonly  called  the  natural  attributes  of  God,  such  as  his  omni- 
presence and  omnipotence.  But  the  spirit  of  the  age,  fostered  by 
the  extensive  study  of  geology,  astronomy,  and  chemistry,  must 
ever  bring  these  perfections  into  bold  relief,  even  at  the  risk  of 
causing  other  properties  to  sink  out  of  view.  We  have  been  en- 
deavoring to  bring  under  notice  the  phenomena  that  are  fitted  to 
correct  these  views  of  the  Divine  character,  which  are  so  prevalent 
and  yet  withal  so  superficial  and  inadequate. 

FIRST,  THE  MECHANICAL  VIEW  OF  GOD.  This  view  is  the 
natural  product  of  a  mechanical  age.  It  is  an  age  engrossed  in 
studying  the  mere  mechanism  of  nature,  and  its  idea  of  God  comes 
to  be  that  of  a  great  mechanician,  or  an  omnipotent  engineer  con- 
structing worlds  like  steam-engines  to  work  according  to  the  prop- 
erties with  which  they  are  endowed. 

An  Apostle  seems  to  allude  to  this  form  of  infidelity  as  about  to 
appear  in  the  latter  days.  "  Since  the  fathers  fell  asleep,  all  things 
continue  as  they  were  from  the  beginning  of  the  creation."  Strange 
it  is  that  this  infidelity,  proceeding,  no  doubt,  from  the  ungodli- 
ness of  the  heart,  but  taking  its  specific  form  and  particular  direc- 
tion from  the  scientific  character  of  the  age,  should  have  been 
spoken  of  eighteen  centuries  ago  by  a  fisherman  of  Galilee.  This 


THE    DIVINE    CHARACTER.  453 

error  is  to  be  met,  not  by  an  empty  declamation  against  general 
laws,  or  a  crusade  against  tbe  discoveries  of  science,  which  must 
prove  injurious  only  to  the  party  undertaking  it,  but  by  a  narrow 
scrutiny  of  these  general  laws,  and  a  resolution  of  them  into  their^ 
-elements ;  and  by  demonstrating  that  God  is  present  in  the  very 
midst  of  those  things  which  continue  as  they  were — present  just 
as  much  as  he  was  in  the  ages  of  miracles  in  which  the  fathers 
lived,  or  as  he  can  be  in  that  renewal  of  miraculous  interpositions 
which  may  yet  take  place  before  the  history  of  our  world  closes. 
We  will  not  succeed  in  making  persons  avoid  the  poison,  adminis- 
tered in  food,  by  denouncing  the  food,  but  by  carefully  separating 
the  one  from  the  other :  the  most  effective  method,  in  short,  of 
rectifying  error  is  to  separate  the  truth  from  the  error  with  which 
it  has  become  associated. 

We  have  sought  to  eliminate  the  truth  by  exhibiting  nature  in 
its  full  and  living  action.  (1.)  In  the  very  operation  of  physical 
causes  there  must  always  be  the  presence  of  two  or  more  bodies, 
with  their  several  properties  bearing  a  relation  to  each  other,  and 
these  bodies  so  adjusted  as  to  admit  the  action  of  the  properties. 
(2.)  In  those  general  arrangements  so  beneficial,  which  constitute 
general  laws,  there  are  numberless  implied  adaptations  of  substance 
to  substance,  and  property  to  property,  and  cause  to  cause,  and 
all  these  abiding  or  recurring  in  a  world  of  activity  and  change. 
(3.)  There  is  a  vast  number  of  events  falling  out,  not  according  to 
any  general  order  of  recurrence,  but  individually,  and  so  far  as  hu- 
man sagacity  is  concerned,  incidentally  ;  and  constituting  a  power 
by  which,  on  the  one  hand,  God  accomplishes  his  specific  purposes, 
and  by  which,  on  the  other  hand,  man  is  rendered  completely  de- 
pendent on  his  Governor.  Taking  these  characteristics  along  with 
us,  we  have  now  got  introduced  into  the  very  heart  of  God's  works, 
and  can  discover  him  alike  in  the  general  and  the  particular,  and 
hi  the  accommodation  of  both  to  the  character  of  man.  We  are 
now  out  of  that  mechanism  which  minds  of  high  sentiment  feel 
to  be  so  offensive.  We  see  not  only  the  heart  of  the  mechanism, 
we  see  also  the  very  heart  of  the  worker.  It  is  not  now  mere 
wheel  upon  wheel,  and  cylinder  upon  cylinder,  we  see  now  the 
moving  power,  and  the  whole  issue  contemplated  ;  and  in  the 
connection  between  them,  we  discover  the  agent  showing  his 
affection  and  lofty  principle,  his  design  and  benevolence,  his  purity 
and  grace.  All  nature,  before  so  dull,  is  now  lighted  up,  but  with 


454  PREVAILING    DEFECTIVE    VIEWS  OF 

light,  we  have  to  add,  too  brilliant  for  those  eyes  which  prefer  the 
darkness. 

Physical  investigation  gives  the  mere  bones  and  muscles,  and 
these  very  commonly  without  their  connections.  Common  natural 
'theology  gives  us  these  in  their  adjustments,  but  without  the  life,, 
the  full  form,  and  expression.  Both  are  all  too  like  the  plates  of 
bare  anatomy,  so  different  from  the  living  form  of  the  human  body 
But  we  must  go  beyond  a  mere  machine — we  must  go  beyond  ar> 
organism — we  must  show  how  the  works  of  God  testify  of  one  whc 
lives  and  acts,  who  loves  his  creatures,  and  indicates  his  approba- 
tion of  all  that  is  good,  and  disapprobation  of  all  that  is  eviL 
Science,  in  short,  gives  us  the  mere  ANATOMY  of  the  body  of 
nature,  instructive,  no  doubt,  in  its  exhibition  of  important  mem- 
bers and  organs  :  common  natural  theology  gives  the  PHYSI- 
OLOGY of  nature,  and  shows  us  the  full  frame  in  its  beautiful  pro- 
portions :  but  the  human  mind  will  not  rest  (ill,  in  the  region  of 
a  higher  art,  we  have  also  its  PHYSIOGNOMY,  and  nature  pre- 
sented in  its  living  forms,  its  face  radiant  with  smiles,  and  the 
deep  lines  of  thought  and  character  inscribed  on  its  forehead. 
Such  is  the  figure  we  have  endeavored  to  present,  rising  beyond 
machinery  to  life,  and  beyond  law  to  love,  and  finding  the  traces 
of  a  living  God  whom  we  may  love,  admire,  and  trust,,  and  at  the 
same  time  revere  and  adore,  and  whose  image,  as  we  cherish  itr 
assimilates  our  character  to  itself. 

SECONDLY,  THE  SENTIMENTAL  VIEW  OF  GOD.  This  is  the 
product  of  the  poetry  as  the  other  is  of  the  science  of  the  times  ;. 
or  to  go  deeper,  the  one  is  the  creation  of  the  imagination  and 
emotions,  as  the  other  is  of  the  mere  intellect  empirically  exer- 
cised, and  both  under  the  guidance  of  an  unholy  heart.  The  one 
view,  like  the  other,  is  not  so  much  erroneous  as  it  is  defective. 
Let  us  clothe  the  Divine  character  with  as  bright  a  robe  of  love- 
liness as  we  please ;  but  let  us  not  pluck  from  him,  meanwhile,, 
his  sceptre  and  his  crown,  or  represent  him  as  indifferent  alike  to 
evil  and  to  good. 

We  have  endeavored  to  go  down  deeper  than  the  mere  floating 
feelings,  in  which,  as  in  a  shining  atmosphere,  so  many  envelop 
a  body  that  is  truly  dark  in  itself,  and  call  it  the  God  of  Light. 
(1.)  There  are  arrangements  of  Divine  Providence  by  which  God 
is  visibly  seen  to  restrain,  to  correct,  and  punish  mankind.  (2.) 
There  is  a  law  in  the  heart  which  leads  the  possessor  to  approve 
of  that  which  is  morally  good,  and  disapprove  of  that  which  is- 


THE    DIVINE    CHARACTER.  455 

•evil,  and  that  even  when  he  is  neglecting  the  one  and  committing 
the  other  ;  and  all  this  points  to  an  attribute  in  the  Divine  charac- 
ter, which  we  may  call  his  righteousness,. and  which  is  no  less 
essential  to  his  nature  than  his  benevolence.  (3.)  There  is  an 
evil  conscience  which  charges  the  possessor  with  guilt,  and  reveals 
impending  judgments,  while  it  makes  known  no  method  of  atone- 
ment, and  the  whole  pointing  to  an  offended  God.  These  are 
facts  pressing  themselves  on  our  notice  from  without  and  from 
within,  and  which  we  are  not  at  liberty  to  leave  out  of  account, 
in  forming  a  basis  on  which  to  construct  our  idea  of  a  God. 

Taking  these  facts  along  with  us,  we  rise  above  a  Divinity,  the 
mere  creation  of  sentiment.  Such  a  God,  with  reverence  be  it 
spoken,  were  not  worthy  to  rule  this  great  universe.  We  have 
sought  to  rise  to  the  conception  of  a  God  fitted  to  govern  the 
world,  and  to  awe  mankind  into  obedience  and  submission  without 
any  detraction  from  his  love.  True,  he  is  a  God  on  whom  the  eye 
of  the  sinner,  determined  to  continue  in  his  sin,  does  not  delight 
to  rest,  and  whom  the  wicked  will  hate  just  because  they  are 
wicked.  But  even  in  the  very  bosoms  of  such  God  has  a  witness 
which  testifies  that  his  character  is  very  beautiful ;  and  which 
declares  that  it  would  be  good  for  man  were  his»eyes  so  strength- 
ened that  he  could  gaze  upon  it  with  pleasure,  and  were  his 
character  shining  in  the  light  reflected  from  it. 

The  prevailing  religions  of  the  world,  whether  Pagan  or  nomi- 
nally Christian,  keep  man  on  the  level  on  which  he  already  is,  or 
they  degrade  him  lower.  We  have  endeavored  to  present  a  God; 
whom  we  are  constrained  to  worship  and  adore  while  we  love  him, 
and  whose  character  cannot  be  believingly  contemplated,  without 
elevating  the  character  of  the  person  contemplating  it.  We  feel 
ourselves  exalted  in  exalting  him.  We  are  honored  in  giving 
honor  to  God. 

There  are  not  a  few  in  our  day  who,  instead  of  looking  to  the 
true  character  of  God,  look  merely  at  certain  pleasing  accompani- 
ments ;  and  instead  of  the  true  light,  allow  their  eye  to  rest  upon 
the  clouds  gilded  by  his  beams,  and  which  fade  like  the  blaze  of 
the  evening  sky  into  darkness  while  we  gaze  upon  it.  We  would 
fix  the  eye  on  God  himself,  shining  forever  in  these  heavens,  and 
whose  beams  melt  that  which  is  hardened,  and  warm  that  which 
is  cold  on  the  earth — 

As  the  great  sun,  when  he  his  influence 

Sheds  on  the  frost-bound  waters,  the  glad  stream 

Flows  to  the  ray,  and  warbles  as  it  flows. — COLEEIDOB. 


456  PREVAILING    DEFECTIVE    VIEWS    OP 

THIRDLY,  THE  PANTHEISTIC  VIEW  OF  GOD.  This  is  the 
combined  result  of  the  influences,  which,  when  existing  separately, 
produce  one  or  other  o.f  the  views  which  we  have  just  been  con- 
templating. 

"  Thy  life,  as  alone  the  finite  mind  can  conceive  it,  is  self-form- 
ing, self-representing  will,  which,  clothed  to  the  eye  of  the  mortal 
with  multitudinous  sensuous  forms,  flows  through  me  and  the 
whole  immeasurable  universe — here  streaming  as  self-creating 
matter  through  my  veins  and  muscles — there  pouring  its  abun- 
dance into  the  tree,  the  flower,  the  grass.  Creative  life  flows  like 
a  continuous  stream,  drop  on  drop,  in  all  forms  in  which  my  eye 
can  follow  it,  and  into  the  mysterious  darkness  where  my  own 
frame  was  formed,  dancing  and  rejoicing  in  the  animal,  and  pre- 
senting every  moment  in  a  new  form  the  only  principle  of  motion, 
that  from  one  end  of  the  universe  to  the  other,  conducts  the  har- 
monious movement."* 

Such  is  the  blank  and  melancholy  result  to  which  German 
metaphysics  seem  to  have  conducted  a  large  portion  of  the  think- 
ing mind  of  the  continent  of  Europe.  The  result  varies  in  some 
lesser  particulars,  but  is  much  the  same  to  all  practical  purposes, 
whether  exhibited  in  the  ethereal  essence  developing  itself  accord- 
ing to  the  law  of  Schelling,  or  the  logical  self-unfolding  process  of 
Hegel,  or  the  conglomerate  abstractions  of  Cousin — all  agree  in 
this,  that  they  are  "  power  without  personality,  and  essence  with- 
out feeling."t  "  The  one  says,  that  God  is  the  universe ;  the 
other,  that  the  universe  is  God.  Diderot  and  Strauss  can  here 
shake  hands,  and  alike  rejoice  in  the  impious  purpose  of  sinking 
the  personality  of  the  deity  into  an  abstraction,  which  the  holy 
cannot  love,  and  which  the  wicked  need  not  fear."t 

No  doubt,  the  imagination  is  often  deceived  by  the  gay  drapery 
in  which  the  object  set  forth  to  our  contemplation  by  Pantheism 
is  decked,  and  the  intellect,  dizzied  by  the  many  turnings  of  so- 
phistry through  which  it  has  been  carried  before  the  vision  is  dis- 
closed, is  the  less  capable  of  detecting  the  deception  ;  yet  the  heart, 
more  faithful  than  the  head,  will  feel  at  times  that  it  is  but  a 
phantom  which  it  is  required  to  love  and  worship,  and  that  truly 
within  there  is  neither  heart  nor  life,  though  there  may  be  grace 
and  motion  in  the  outward  form.  The  worshipper  carried  through 
the  long  avenues  of  columns  and  statues,  and  the  splendid  halls 

*  Fichte,  Destination  of  Man.  f  Vinet 

t  Morell's  Hist,  of  Phil,  ii.  610. 


THE    DIVINE    CHARACTER.  457 

of  the  ancient  temple  of  the  Egyptian  Thebes,  was  not  conducted 
at  last  to  a  more  miserable  termination,  when  in  the  inner  shrine 
he  found  one  of  the  lower  animals,  than  the  follower  of  a  modern 
philosopher,  when  conducted  through  processes,  laws,  and  develop- 
ments to  a  divinity,  who  has  less  of  separate  sensation  and  con- 
sciousness and  life  than  the  very  brutes  which  Egypt  declared  to 
be  its  gods. 

A  German  philosopher  has  lost  himself  in  the  windings  of 
nature,  as  the  traveller  will  lose  himself  among  the  trees  and  in- 
tertangled  branches  of  a  forest.  There  is  a  way  through  the 
wood,  which  humbler  men,  which  peasants  know;  but  which  the 
proud  will  not  submit  to  inquire  about,  and  they  toil  and  wander 
amidst  gorgeous  scenes,  and  think  that  they  are  making  progress, 
and  they  do  turn  aside  many  a  branch  which  would  interpose 
itself  in  the  way,  and  they  exert  prodigious  strength,  and  amazing 
ingenuity,  but  having  never  got  the  near  way,  or  the  right  way, 
the  paths  in  which  they  walk  either  conduct  them  into  deepening 
thickets  of  error,  or  land  them  nearly  at  the  point  at  which  they 
started.  "By  the  roaring  billows  of  time,  thou  are  not  engulfed, 
but  borne  aloft  into  the  azure  of  eternity."  By  the  roaring  billows 
of  proud  speculation,  we  would  rather  say,  thou  art  but  borne 
along  to  that  dim  region  in  which  we  lose  sight  of  thee. 

Now,  we  have  not  been  unwilling  to  enter  these  thickets  of 
nature,  but  we  have  been  bent  on  finding  a  clear  way  through 
them.  We  have  found,  as  we  conceive,  something  more  than  a 
mere  power,  or  principle,  or  abstraction ;  we  have  reached  a  per- 
sonal god,  whose  character  is  in  his  works,  but  whose  works  do 
not  constitute  his  nature  or  character.  The  painter's  soul  is  no 
doubt  thrown  into  his  painting ;  and  the  sculptor's  and  architect's 
into  their  statues  and  buildings ;  but  their  souls  meanwhile  exist 
apart,  and  are  capable  of  other  acts  besides  these.  In  a  sense,  as 
true  as  it  is  grand,  the  soul  of  the  creator  is  streaming  through 
the  order  and  life  of  creation  ;  but  meanwhile  he  exists  indepen- 
dent of  and  far  above  them. 

Such*  is  the  view  suggested  by  the  very  traces  of  design  in 
nature,  and  the  multiplied  adjustments  required  in  order  to  the 
harmony  of  nature's  operations.  It  is  not  mere  law  or  develop- 
ment which  will  give  us  existing  nature,  with  its  curious  coinci- 
dences, its  intended  accidents,  and  predetermined  contingencies ; 
but  a  mind  seeing  and  ordaining  beforehand,  at  once  contempla- 
ting the  means  and  the  end.  Nature  tells  us  regarding  itself,  that 


458 


CHARACTER    OP    GOD 


it  is  not  a  power  coeval  and  co-ordinate  with  God,  but  a  work 
planned  and  executed  by  a  maker  existing  before  it,  and  still  ex- 
isting above  it.  Then  these  views  are  strengthened  by  all  that 
we  learn  of  the  moral  government  of  God.  We  discover  in  the 
very  heart  of  man  the  traces  of  a  governor  to  call  him  to  account, 
having  separate  consciousness  und  specific  character,  and  above 
the  world  of  which  he  is  both  the  Governor  and  Judge. 

SECTION  III— CHARACTER  OF   GOD  AS  REVEALED  IN  SCRIPTURE. 

"  Hear,  O  Israel,  the  Lord  our  God  is  one  Lord."  We  quote 
this  language  in  the  way  of  adaptation — not  in  its  original  mean- 
ing, (when  it  simply  states  the  doctrine  of  the  unity  of  God,)  but 
as  expressive  of  the  important  truth,  that  there  is  a  wonderful 
consistency,  or  rather  identity,  in  the  representation  given  of  the 
Divine  character  in  the  Scriptures.  "  The  God  of  Israel  is  one 
Lord." 

"  The  Bible  itself  is  a  standing  and  an  astonishing  miracle. 
Written,  fragment  by  fragment,  throughout  the  course  of  fifteen 
centuries,  under  different  states  of  society,  and  in  different  lan- 
guages, by  persons  of  the  most  opposite  tempers,  talents,  and  con- 
ditions, learned  and  unlearned,  prince  and  peasant,  bond  and  free ; 
cast  into  every  form  of  instructive  composition  and  good  writing, 
history,  prophecy,  poetry,  allegory,  emblematic  representation, 
judicious  interpretation,  literal  statement,  precept,  example,  pro- 
verbs, disquisition,  epistle,  sermon,  prayer ;  in  short,  all  rational 
shapes  of  human  discourse,  and  treating,  moreover,  of  subjects 
not  obvious,  but  most  difficult ; — its  authors  are  not  found,  like 
other  writers,  contradicting  one  another  upon  the  most  ordinary 
matters  of  fact  and  opinion,  but  are  at  harmony  upon  the  whole 
of  their  sublime  and  momentous  scheme."* 

In  the  language  now  quoted,  reference  is  made  to  one  of  the 
most  convincing  of  the  self-evidencing  truths  of  that  word,  which 
carries  within  itself  its  own  credibility,  and  is  visible  in  its  own 
light.  We  have  an  example  in  the  thoroughly  consistent  repre- 
sentation given  of  the  character  of  God.  It  is  the  same  God  ex- 
hibited under  the  patriarchal,  the  Jewish,  and  the  Christian  dis- 
pensations. Except  in  the  degree  of  development,  there  is  no 
difference  between  God  as  revealed  in  Eden,  on  Sinai,  and  on 
Ca.vary ;  between  God  as  exhibited  in  the  books  of  Moses,  and 

*  Discourse  by  Professor  Maclagan. 


AS    REVEALED    IN    SCRIPTURE.  459 

God  as  exhibited  so  many  centuries  later  in  the  writings  of  Paul 
and  John.  In  the  garden  we  have  the  lawgiver,  and  we  have 
indications,  too,  of  the  Saviour.  On  Mount  Sinai,  there  is  the 
same  combination  of  awful  justice  and  condescending  mercy.  In 
the  mysterious  transactions  on  Calvary,  there  is  an  awful  forsak- 
ing and  a  fearful  darkness,  emblematic  of  the  righteousness  and 
indignation  of  God,  as  there  is  also  a  melting  tenderness  in  the 
words  of  our  Lord  breathing  forgiveness  and  love,  and  telling  of 
an  opened  paradise.  The  first  book  discloses  to  us,  near  its 
commencement,  a  worshipper  offering  a  lamb  in  sacrifice,  and  the 
last  shows  a  lamb  as  it  had  been  slain  in  the  midst  of  the  throne 
of  God.  To  Moses  he  discloses  himself  as  the  Jehovah,  the  Lord 
God,  "  merciful  and  gracious,  long-suffering,  and  abundant  in 
goodness,  in  truth,"  and  that  "will  by  no  means  clear  the  guilty." 
Paul  speaks  of  him  as  "just,  and  yet  thejustifier  of  the  ungodly;" 
and  John,  as  "  faithful  and  just  to  forgive  us  our  sins."  Whence 
this  harmony  or  rather  unity  in  the  Divine  character?  Whence 
this  wonderful  correspondence  in  the  portraits  drawn  by  so  many 
different  hands  ?  We  can  only  account  for  it  by  supposing  that 
they  all  drew  from  one  great  original. 

We  have  endeavored  to  show  that  the  God  of  revelation  is  also 
the  God  of  nature,  when  nature  is  rightly  expounded,  and  when 
all  its  phenomena  are  contemplated.  An  exalted  view  of  the 
spiritual  nature  of  man  will  at  once  conduct  to  a  belief  in  the 
spiritual  character  of  God.  Enlarged  conceptions  of  space  and 
time,  and  of  the  magnitude  of  creation,  will  at  once  suggest  an 
omnipotent  and  omnipresent  God.  The  providence  of  God  indi- 
cates wisdom  and  care,  with  government  the  most  particular  and 
minute.  The  moral  principle  in  man,  pointing  to  an  excellence 
in  God  to  be  admired,'  but  to  an  excellence  which  man  does  not 
possess,  gives  evidence  of  a  holy  God  governing  a  fallen  race. 
Leave  out  any  of  these  classes  of  natural  phenomena,  and  we 
have  a  God  under  some  one  or  other  of  the  partial  and  imperfect 
forms  in  which  he  has  been  presented  in  different  ages  and  na- 
tions. Combine  the  whole,  and  we  have  a  God  identical  with  the 
Jehovah  of  the  Scriptures. 

All  professed  religions  have  seized  on  some  one  or  other  of  the 
features  of  God,  and  their  votaries  have  been  determined  in  the 
choice  which  they  have  made  by  the  prevailing  sentiments  of 
their  hearts, .and  the  habits  in  which  they  have  been  trained.  In 
those  eastern  countries  in  which  the  mass  of  the  people  have  beeo 


460  CHARACTER*  OF    GOD 

consigned  to  a  slavish  subjection  to  authority,  the  popular  reli- 
gions have  represented  the  supernatural  power  as  exercising  an 
iron  despotism,  and  exacting  a  deep  prostration.  The  dreamy 
and  meditative  spirits  of  the  same  region  again  have  cherished 
abstractions  which  widen,  and  are  dissipated  more  and  more,  till 
they  are  lost  in  an  illusive  and 'ethereal  nonentity.  Among  the 
more  active  and  spirited  and  liberty-loving  nations  of  western 
Asia  and  eastern  Europe,  the  popular  faith  became  more  individ- 
ual, and  personal,  and  anthropomorphic,  and  they  approached 
their  gods  with  a  greater  feeling  of  familiarity.  Each  divinity 
among  the  Greeks  had  a  special  character  and  special  objects  of 
interest,  and  the  Pantheon  embodied  all  the  popular  virtues  and 
vices  of  the  country.  In  less  civilized  countries,  where  the  inhab- 
itants ranged  over  wide  forests  and  rugged  mountains,  and  the 
tribes  were  generally  at  fierce  war  with  each  other,  the  presiding 
divinities  were  painted  in  colors  of  blood,  or  in  robes  of  darkness. 
And  let  us  observe  how,  in  each  of  these  pictures  there  is  the 
seizing  of  some  real  feature  of  the  character  of  God,  though  fear- 
fully distorted,  and  brought  out  with  horrid  prominence.  Vulgar 
minds  would  ascribe  all  this  to  the  priesthood,  forgetting  that  the 
priesthood  itself,  so  different  in  different  nations,  is  the  product, 
and  not  the  cause  of  the  tastes,  the  desires,  and  the  cravings  of 
our  nature,  which  it  may  yet,  however,  by  reaction,  greatly  foster 
and  augment.  The  question  demands  an  answer,  why,  of  all 
people,  the  ancient  Hebrews  should  be  the  only  nation  which  suc- 
ceeded in  embracing  all  that  is  great  and  lovely,  to  the  exclusion 
of  all  that  is  degrading  and  offensive  ?  Ingenious  minds  may 
speculate  as  they  please,  but  sound  reason  will  ever  most  fondly 
rest  on  the  belief  in  a  supernatural  communication  as  alone  able 
to  explain  the  phenomenon. 

How  totally  different  is  the  God  of  the  Hebrews  from  the  gods 
believed  in  and  worshipped  by  persons  who  lived  in  the  neighbor- 
ing countries,  and  in  the  same  states  of  society  !  What  a  differ- 
ence between  Jehovah — and  Osiris,  or  Baal,  or  Jupiter,  not  to 
speak  of  Astarte,  and  Venus,  and  Bacchus  !  The  characters  differ 
not  only  in  degree,  but  they  belong  to  a  different  class  or  order, 
and  are  without  a  single  common  virtue,  except  that  suggested  by 
an  unpacified  conscience  as  it  points  to  a  God  displeased  with  hu- 
man rebellion  and  folly. 

The  God  of  Israel,  on  the  other  hand,  is  altogether  different 
from  the  God  of  the  philosophers,  whether  of  the  demi-civilized 


AS    REVEALED    IN    SCRIPTURE.  461 

nations  of  the  east,  of  ancient  Greece  and  Rome,  or  modern  Europe. 
It  might  be  easy,  we  are  aware,  to  cull  isolated  passages  from 
Plato,  Cicero,  and  Seneca,  in  which  there  appear  to  be  wonderfully 
enlarged  views  given  of  the  Divine  nature  ;  but  when  the  whole 
theology  of  these  authors  is  taken  in  its  combination,  we  find  the 
select  quotations  to  be  utterly  deceptive.  Take  Greece  and  Rome 
in  their  ripest  periods,  and  examine  their  boasted  "disciplines." 
The  Epicureans  removed  their  gods  far  above  the  care  and  super- 
vision of  human  affairs  ;  in  short,  as  Cicero  says,  "  admitted  their 
existence  in  words,  but  denied  it  in  fact."*  The  Academics  may 
be  regarded  as  represented  by  Cicero:  they  delighted  in  discussing 
everything,  but  they  believed  little.  The  Peripatetics  habitually 
overlooked  Divine  things,  and  their  views  of  God  are  acknowledged 
to  be  miserably  meagre  and  unsatisfactory.  There  remains  only 
among  these  famous  sects  that  of  the  Stoics,  usually  represented 
as  the  most  advanced  of  all  the  sects  of  Greece  or  Rome  in  the 
knowledge  of  Deity.  Now,  according  to  them,  there  was  one 
great  Divine  Principle  or  Being,  with  a  vast  number  of  other  gods. 
This  Being  or  Principle  was  represented  by  them  as  of  the  nature 
of  fire,  and  was  identified  with  the  element  fire,  regarded  by  them 
as  the  most  elevated  and  powerful  of  all  the  elements.  This  Di- 
vine power  of  fire  they  represented  as  the  governing  principle  of 
the  universe,  regulating  all  things  by  cycles.  In  these  cycles, 
which  followed  one  another  in  never-ending  succession,  there  was 
a  periodical  conflagration,  in  which  all  things  were  consumed  into 
the  elemental  fire  or  Divine  principle  which  at  this  period  reigned 
alone.  Then,  in  the  proper  course  of  development,  this  ethereal 
substance  began  to  condense  ;  and  first  the  sun,  the  heavenly 
bodies  and  the  gods  were  formed,  and  then  the  earth  and  men, 
and  these  continued  to  act  their  allotted  part  till  the  cycle  closed 
with  another  conflagration,  in  which  heaven  and  earth,  and  gods 
and  men,  were  absorbed  in  the  divine  and  all-devouring  ether. 
It  might  be  easy  to  find  language  in  the  writings  of  this  sect 
sounding  loftily  to  the  ear,  (the  Stoics  were  addicted  to  lofty  phrases 
in  ethics  and  religion ;)  but  such  was  really  the  theology  of  the 
sect  which  produced  the  hymn  of  Cleanthes,  which  Cicero  selects 
to  represent  sound  and  enlightened  theism,  and  which  produced 
Seneca,  Epictetus,  and  Antoninus,  the  greatest  divines  and  mor- 
alists of  all  heathen  antiquity.  May  we  not  hold  the  Stoic  Deity 

*  Verbis  ponunt  re  tollunt  Deos. — De  Nat  Deor. 


462  CHARACTER   OP   GOD 

to  be  the  highest  product  which  the  Greek  and  Roman  intellect 
could  furmsh  in  Divinity  1 

How  different  at  this  day  is  the  God  of  revelation  from  the  god 
of  abstract  and  academic  philosophy,  whether  it  be  that  of  specu- 
lative Germany,  or  sentimental  France,  matter-of-fact  England) 
or  Scotland  with  an  intellect  as.  hard  as  its  rocks.  These  gods 
are  all  of  a  class.  However  they  may  differ  in  lesser  matters, 
some  of  them  being  painted  in  more  meagre  and  others  in  more 
gorgeous  colors,  they  all  agree  in  this,  that  they  are  shorn  of  the 
attribute  of  holiness.  They  all  differ  from  the  living  and  true 
God,  who,  while  clothed  in  attributes  as  lofty  as  any  which  the 
reason  of  philosophers  can  develop,  or  the  imagination  of  poets  can 
conceive,  is  yet  raised  far  above  their  crude  conceptions,  by  being 
constituted  a  holy  governor  and  judge. 

But  here  we  must  draw  a  distinction,  to  save  ourselves  from  a 
seeming  contradiction.  We  assert,  on  the  one  hand,  that  in  every 
mind  there  are  reflected  the  living  lineaments  of  the  true  God, 
and  yet,  on  the  other,  that  unaided  reason  has  ever  failed  to  de- 
velop them  except  in  a  partial  way.  There  is  no  real  inconsist- 
ency here.  The  difficulties  in  the  way  of  discovering  the  true 
character  of  God  lie  in  the  prejudices  and  partialities  of  the  heart* 
These  have  so  narrowed  and  warped  the  mind,  that  it  has  failed 
to  rise  to  a  full  idea  of  the  Divine  character,  Nevertheless,  when 
that  idea  has  been  developed  by  those  who  have  been  carried  up 
into  a  higher  region  by  a  supernatural  power,  the  human  mind 
may  be  capable  of  declaring  that  this  idea  is  the  true  one.  Ne- 
buchadnezzar could  not  recall  the  splendid  image  of  gold,  and 
silver,  and  brass,  and  iron,  which  he  had  saen  in  the  visions  of  the 
night,  though  he  seems  to  have  had  some  straggling  recollections 
of  it.  What  his  own  memory  and  the  knowledge  of  his  sages 
could  not  produce  was  accomplished  by  the  prophet,  when  he 
made  the  image  stand  distinctly,  and  with  all  its  fulness  of  mean* 
ing,  before  him,  and  then  he  instantly  recognized  it.  Now,  we 
may  hold  that  there  are  faint  lines  in  the  Divine  character,  which 
men  themselves  cannot  read  as  they  stand  alone  in  the  light  of 
nature,  but  which,  being  read  in  the  purer  light  of  revelation, 
disclose  the  very  God  whom  this  revelation  fully  describes  and 
exhibits.  Some  of  the  truths  which  we  are  expounding  stand  on 
the  very  horizon  of  human  vision,  and  are  seen  very  dimly  by  the 
unassisted  eye ;  but  when  the  optic  glass  of  revelation  is  directed 
towards  them,  these  misty  shapes  start  into  defined  forms,  and  we 


AS    REVEALED    IN   SCRIPTURE.  463 

are  satisfied  at  once  of  the  correctness  of  the  guesses  made  with- 
out the  telescope,  and  of  the  accuracy  of  the  telescope  which  has 
given  such  distinctness  to  the  indefinite.  We  are  entitled,  then, 
in  perfect  consistency,  to  wield  a  double  argument,  and,  in  the 
first  place,  to  show  that  the  Scriptural  view  of  the  Divine  charac- 
ter is  altogether  in  unison  with  that  furnished  by  the  works  of 
God;  and.  in  the  second  place,  from  the  beautiful  agreement  of 
the  two,  to  establish  the  Divine  original  of  that  word  in  which  the 
Divine  character  is  so  accurately  represented.  So  far  from  being 
contradictory,  we  are  inclined  to  hold  that  the  one  involves  the 
other,  and  that  they  meet  in  the  necessary  harmony  of  true  reason 
and  real  revelation. 

All  this  appears  the  more  evident  when  we  consider  that  in  the 
various  false  religions  which  have  existed  in  the  world,  there  are 
always  to  be  found  some  of  those  conceptions  which  enter  into 
the  true  idea.  All  religions  exhibit  some  part  of  the  truth,  being 
the  part  which  the  human  heart  was  led  to  fix  on  in  the  circum- 
stances. In  short,  false  and  defective  religions  have,  under  the 
guidance  of  human  nature,  singled  out  merely  those  properties 
of  God  which  impressed  that  nature  of  man,  while  in  revelation 
we  have  the  full  figure,  drawn  evidently  by  parties  to  whom  God 
had  completely  revealed  himself. 

In  particular,  we  find  in  all  religions  which  have  recommended 
themselves  to  large  bodies  of  mankind,  and  which  have  exercised 
a  powerful  influence  upon  the  human  mind — a  deep  impression 
of  man  having  rendered  himself  obnoxious  by  transgression  to  a 
God  who  has  prescribed  a  moral  law,  and  is  offended  by  disobe- 
dience. The  prevalence  of  such  a  sentiment  shows  how  deeply 
it  is  seated  in  the  human  heart,  and  how  unfitted  philosophical 
theism,  which  provides  nothing  piacular,  is  to  meet  the  felt  wants 
of  mankind.  While  the  Scriptures  have  not  overlooked  this 
property  of  the  Divine  nature,  they  have  stripped  it  of  all  the 
offensive  adjuncts  with  which  it  is  usually  associated,  and  com- 
bined with  it  all  those  lofty  natural  perfections  which  the  philoso- 
pher delights  to  contemplate,  and  with  a  love  as  unbounded  and 
tender  as  the  sentiments  of  man's  heart  have  ever  conceived  ;  thus 
revealing  a  combination,  of  each  part  of  which  the  understanding, 
the  conscience,  and  the  heart,  are  constrained  to  approve,  but 
which,  notwithstanding,  has  never  been  so  exhibited  in  its  union 
by  the  highest  efforts  of  unaided  reason. 


CHAPTER  II. 

RESTORATION  OF  MAN. 

SECTION  I.— SYMPTOMS  OF  INTENDED  RESTORATION. 

OUR  argument  under  this  particular  section  is  far  from  being 
very  consecutive  or  conclusive.  It  is  safer,  to  say  the  least  of  it, 
to  establish  a  posteriori  that  God  has  afforded  a  means  of  restora- 
tion, than  to  waste  ingenuity  in  proving  a  priori  that  such  an 
interposition  of  heaven  is  probable.  In  the  conducting  of  this 
latter  argument,  we  find  invariably  that  not  a  little  is  assumed 
which  could  have  been  discovered  or  rendered  certain  only  by  the 
revelation  itself. 

The  few  scattered  observations  which  we  have  to  offer  are  of  an 
a  posteriori  and  inductive  character.  We  are  to  point  to  some 
facts  which  seem  to  indicate  that  God  did  intend  to  institute  a 
method  of  restoring  the  race.  In  order  to  attain  even  to  such  a 
presumption  or  probability,  we  must  take  into  account  two  appa- 
rently opposite  classes  of  facts. 

FIRST,  we  must  carry  along  with  us  a  deep  sense  of  human 
guilt,  and  of  God's  enmity  to  sin.  Without  doing  so,  we  cannot 
advance  a  step  in  the  argument.  Proceed  on  the  idea  that  man 
is  very  much  what  God  would  have  him  to  be,  and  it  is  impossible 
to  find  a  ground  on  which  to  build  an  expectation  of  the  interpo- 
sition of  heaven.  It  is  at  this  point  that  the  argument  of  those 
who  would  demonstrate  a  priori  the  necessity  for  a  Divine  reve- 
lation is  felt  to  be  the  weakest.  If  mankind  are  in  an  unfallen 
state,  and  their  Maker  upon  the  whole  satisfied  with  them,  no 
other  improvement  can  be  reasonably  looked  for  beyond  that 
which  may  be  expected  to  proceed  from  human  intelligence  and 
philanthropy.  We  cannot  get  a  foundation  for  the  argument  till 
certain  facts  have  been  established.  In  the  a  posteriori  reasoning 
which  we  now  pursue,  we  proceed  on  the  demonstration  which 
we  have  given  of  the  sinfulness  of  the  race,  and  the  just  indigna- 
tion of  the  Governor  of  the  world. 

* 

I 


SYMPTOMS    OF    INTENDED    RESTORATION.  465 

This  fact  alone,  however,  would  not  enable  us  to  construct  an 
argument.  For  it  might  be  urged,  with  some  plausibility,  that 
God  meant  to  allow  the  race  to  continue  in  their  present  fallen 
and  degraded  condition,  without  any  special  interference  or  res- 
toration beyond  that  which  might  proceed  from  human  agency. 

And  so  we  must,  SECONDLY,  take  along  with  us  the  deep  in- 
terest which  God  takes  in  the  happiness  and  virtue  of  the  race. 
Such  facts  as  these  press  themselves  upon  our  notice.  (1.)  There 
is  the  continued  existence  of  mankind  upon  the  earth,  showing 
that  if  God  is  displeased  with  human  sinfulness,  he  is  at  the  same 
time  keeping  up  a  system  of  government,  having  a  special  respect 
to  them,  and  allowing  them  a  period  of  respite  and  probation. 
(2.)  There  are  the  numberless  bounties  which  mankind  enjoy, 
showing  that  in  spite  of  human  sinfulness,  God  can  be  their  ben- 
efactor. (3.)  Then  there  are  the  pains  which  God  is  taking  in  his 
government  to  recommend  and  uphold  virtue. 

It  is  from  the  sharp  collision  of  these  classes  of  facts  that  we 
derive  any  spark  fitted  to  shed  light  upon  the  destinies  of  our  world. 

The  former,  if  taken  alone,  could  not  lead  us  to  suppose  that 
God  meant  to  do  anything  for  a  race  under  his  displeasure.  The 
latter,  considered  alone,  might  rather  seem  to  indicate  that  God 
was  contented  with  mankind,  and  meant  to  give  them  nothing 
beyond  what  they  naturally  possess.  But  let  us  take  along  with 
us  the  general  fact  that  God  is  offended  with  human  guilt,  and 
connect  it  with  the  other  fact  that  he  is  showering  benefits  upon 
the  human  race ;  and  there  results  a  possibility,  a  presumption 
if  not  a  probability,  that  God  intends  to  interpose  for  the  vindica- 
tion of  a  government  which  we  regard  as  dishonored,  and  the 
restoration  of  a  race  in  which  he  is  deeply  interested.  We  cannot 
conceive  of  a  thinking  mind  seriously  contemplating  these  two 
classes  of  facts,  without  there  following  a  wish  that  there  might 
be  something  to  reconcile  them — may  we  not  add,  without  a  hope 
or  expectation,  that  the  God  who  hates  sin,  and  yet  loves  man- 
kind, would  manifest  himself  in  a  way  fitted  to  exhibit  his  char- 
acter under  both  these  lights  in  combination ?  "I  perceive  that 
God  is  offended  with  mankind,"  would  be  the  way  in  which  such 
a  mind  would  reason,  "and  I  see  that  he  is  disposed  to  be  merci- 
ful, and  he  would  only  be  following  out  his  own  method  of  pro- 
cedure were  he  to  devise  and  execute  some  plan  by  which  man 
might  know  the  mystery  of  his  relation  to  God,  and  rise  from  his 
present  degradation." 

30 


466  SYMPTOMS    OF    INTENDED   RESTORATION. 

Upon  these  two  general  facts  some  general  considerations  may 
be  founded,  carrying  a  certain  amount  of  weight  with  them. 

(1.)  Mankind  seem  to  be  a  race  fallen,  but  not  a  race -aban- 
doned— a  race  which  cannot,  rise  of  itself,  but  a  race  which  seems 
to  be  kept  with  care  because  it  is  yet  to  rise.  When  we  see  per- 
sons taking  pains  to  deck  a  tomb,  -we  are  led  to  suppose  that  (hey 
expect  the  dead  to  rise  again.  The  paintings,  the  ornaments  and 
devices  on  the  sepulchres  of  ancient  Egypt  and  Etruria,  all  seem 
to  indicate  that  those  bodies  on  which  such  delicate  attention  was 
lavished  were  expected  to  spring  up  in  renewed  life  and  vigor. 
Some  of  our  readers  may  have  been  struck  with  the  graphic  de- 
scription which  a  popular  writer  gives  of  the  present  condition  of 
the  Holy  Land,  appearing  as  if  it  were  just  waiting  for  the  prom- 
ised renovation.*  "  They  shall  build  the  old  wastes,  they  shall 
raise  up  the  former  desolations,  and  they  shall  repair  the  waste 
cities,  the  desolations  of  many  generations."  And  seeming  as  if 
they  were  waiting  the  fulfilment  of  this  prediction,  there  is  a  soil- 
gathering  in  depth  and  fertility  ;  and  in  the  east  of  the  Jordan 
there  are  numberless  cities  without  inhabitants,  (Buckingham  saw 
from  one  rocky  eminence  upwards  of  twenty-five,)  but  with  their 
houses  yet  standing — in  some  instances,  so  many  as  800  deserted 
dwellings,  all  ready  for  the  inhabitants  who  are  yet  to  dwell  in 
them.  And  does  it  not  look  as  if,  after  the  same  way,  there  were 
among  the  ruins  of  our  nature  some  materials  which  God  is  keep- 
ing with  care  that  he  may  rear  a  new  fabric?  While,  like  the 
old  men  in  Judah,  we  weep  over  the  recollection  of  a  temple  fallen, 
may  we  not  shout  with  the  younger  men  at  the  prospect  of  a  more 
glorious  temple  yet  to  be  built  ? 

(2.)  It  does  look  as  if  our  earth  were  waiting  for  something 
greater  and  better  than  has  ever  yet  been  realized.  "  For  the 
earnest  expectation  of  the  creature  waiteth  for  the  manifestation 
of  the  sons  of  God.  For  the  creature  was  made  subject  to  vanityr 
not  willingly,  but  by  reason  of  him  who  hath  subjected  the  same 
in  hope,  because  the  creature  itself  shall  be  delivered  from  the  bon- 
dage of  corruption  into  the  glorious  liberty  of  the  children  of  God  j 
for  we  know  that  the  whole  creation  groaneth  and  travaileth  in 
pain  together  until  now."  Inanimate  nature  and  the  lower  ani- 
mals do  not  serve  the  noble  ends  which  they  would  have  served 
had  man  walked  upon  the  earth  a  pure  and  sinless  being.  The 
air  of  heaven  as  we  breathe  it  has  to  pass  through  bodies  which 

*  Keith's  Land  of  Israel,  Chap.  viiL 


SYMPTOMS    OP    INTENDED    RESTORATION.  467 

been  polluted  by  sin.  The  food  which  the  earth  furnishes 
has  been  commonly  used  to  pamper  the  bodies  of  those  who  give 
5510  thanks  to  God,  and  to  nourish  strength  which  has  been  ex- 
pended in  breaking  the  law  of  God,  and  dishonoring  his  name. 
That  sun  which  was  to  have  lighted  mankind  on  errands  of  love 
has  now  to  shed  its  beams  upon  the  evil  and  the  unjust  as  they 
prosecute  their  schemes  pf  selfish  aggrandizement.  And  that 
lovely  moon,  and  these  pure  stars,  have  they  not  to  look  on  still 
darker  deeds  of  criminality  which  dare  not  face  the  light  of  day? 
Does  it  not  appear  as  if  these  great  and  beauteous  works  of  God 
were  preserved  for  a  grander  purpose  than  they  have  ever  yet 
served?  that  this  air  is  yet  to  be  breathed  by,  and  the  light  of 
these  heavenly  bodies  to  shine  upon,  beings  as  pure  as  they  them- 
selves are? 

(3.)  How  universal,  too,  the  restlessness,  how  deep  the  groanings 
and  travailings  of  the  human  race.  This  world  is  not  now,  and 
never  has  been,  what  its  inhabitants  would  wish  it  to  be.  Hence, 
the  constant  endeavors  to  improve  it,  and  which  are  successful  at 
least  in  changing  it.  Whether  taken  individually  or  collectively, 
humankind  do  not  feel  themselves  to  be  at  ease.  There  is  a  deep 
uneasiness  in  every  human  bosom,  arising  from  desires  which 
have  not  been  gratified,  and  craving  appetites  for  good  which  has 
not  yet  been  attained.  This  prominent  feature  of  the  individual  is 
also  a  characteristic  of  the  race.  What  never-ending  schemes  for 
the  improvement  of  mankind,  all  proceeding  on  the  principle  that 
mankind  need  to  be  improved.  Science  is  advancing  its  dis- 
coveries, and  politics  its  reforms,  and  all  to  remove  the  evils  under 
which  the  world  is  laboring.  Some  of  these  projects,  it  is  true,  are 
utterly  impracticable,  many  of  them  leave  the  world  just  as  they 
found  it ;  but  still,  the  very  eagerness  with  which  they  are  pro- 
posed and  pursued  shows  that  man  is  not  satisfied  with  his  present 
condition  and  the  world  in  which  he  dwells.  His  exertions  are  too 
often  like  the  struggles  of  the  fever-patient,  issuing  in  no  perma- 
nent improvement  of  his  condition,  but  the  very  writhings  and 
groanings  prove  that  he  is  in  pain,  and  would  wish  to  be  in  a  dif- 
ferent position.  Can  we  suppose  that  such  universal  desires  and 
expectations  would  be  excited  without  a  deep  reason  ?  Do  not  the 
universality,  and  the  fundamental  depth  of  the  desires,  seem  to  in- 
dicate that  they  may  be  gratified  ? 

(4.)  Let  it  be  frankly  admitted,  that  there  is  progress  in  the 
worl/:  They*  =  progress  in  agriculture ;  there  is  progress  in  all 


SYMPTOMS    OF    INTENDED    RESTORATION. 

the  arts  ;  there  is  progress  in  all  the  sciences  ;  the  earth  i*  every 
succeeding  year  made  to  yield  a  greater  quantity  of  produce,  and 
man's  dominion  over  nature  is  rapidly  increasing.  The  fruit  of 
the  discoveries  of  one  age,  contains  the  germ  of  the  discoveries  of 
the  generation  that  follows  j  and  the  new  plant  springs  up  along- 
side of  the  old  one,  to  scatter  seed  "like  its  progenitor  all  around, 
No  valuable  invention  of  human  genius  is  ever  lost,  and  most  of 
them  become  the  means  of  multiplying  themselves  by  a  greater 
than  compound  interest,  and  thus  render  each  succeeding  genera- 
tion richer  than  the  one  which  went  before.  The  wealth  of  all 
preceding  generations  is  thus  to  be  poured  into  the  lap  of  the 
generations  that  are  to  live  in  the  latter  days  of  our  world's 
history. 

How  sad  to  think,  that  amidst  all  these  improvements  in  the 
arts  and  secular  knowledge,  there  should  be  no  corresponding  im- 
provement in  the  morale  of  the  human  character.  A  thousand 
means  have  been  tried,  and  the  tendency  of  many  of  them  has 
been  excellent ;  yet  human  nature  has  continued  as  vain,  as  proud 
and  selfish,  as  much  given  to  lust  and  passion  as  it  ever  was. 
When  some  one  was  enlarging  to  Coleridge  on  the  tendency  for 
good  of  some  scheme  which  was  expected  to  regenerate  the  world, 
the  poet  flung  up  into  the  air  the  down  of  a  thistle  which  grew  by 
the  road-side,  and  went  on  to  say,  "  the  tendency  of  that  thistle  is 
towards  China  ;  but  I  know,  with  assured  certainty,  that  it  will 
never  get  there — nay,  it  is  more  than  probable,  that  after  sundry 
eddyings,  and  gyrations  up  and  down,  and  backwards  and  for- 
wards, it  will  be  found  somewhere  near  the  place  in  which  it 
grew."  Such  has  ever  been  the  issue  of  those  boasted  schemes 
of  human  wisdom  which  have  professed  to  change  the  heart  of 
man.  Human  nature  is  in  this  respect  like  the  salt  sea — all  the 
rivers  that  run  into  which  have  not  changed  its  saltness.  The 
sun  is  daily  evaporating  its  waters,  but  does  not  drink  up  one  par- 
ticle of  that  saline  ingredient.  If  men  will  drink  of  its  bitter 
waters,  they  sicken,  and  madden,  and  die.  It  is  thus  with  that 
malignant  nature  which  we  inherit  and  propagate,  all  human 
means  have  failed  to  purify  it,  and  it  stimulates  to  madness,  dis- 
ease, and  death. 

But  is  there  to  be  a  physical  and  intellectual,  and  no  moral 
progress  ?  Is  the  lesser  to  advance,  and  the  greater  to  remain 
stationary  ?  Does  God  take  a  greater  interest  in  the  mere  im- 
provement of  human  knowledge  and  refinement,  than  in  the  im- 


WHAT    IS    NEEDFUL    FOR    THE    RESTORATION    OF    MAN.     469 

proyement  of  the  heart  and  conduct?  Is  he  to  dissever  more  and 
more  the  physical  and  the  intellectual  from  the  moral  and  re- 
ligious ;  and  move  on  the  former,  while  the  other  continues  where 
it  was,  to  impress  us  the  more  with  the  fearful  gap  between  1  Or 
rather,  does  not  the  whole  government  of  God  show  that  he  values 
the  former  chiefly  as  subsidiary  to  the  latter  ?  In  the  past  progress 
of  the  one,  we  have  thus  a  presumption  in  favor  of  the  coming 
progress  of  the  other.  The  one  advances  by  human  agency,  un- 
der the  ordinary  proceeding  of  Providence  ;  and  requires  no  doubt 
means,  but  not  miracles.  The  other,  it  seems,  cannot  attain  its  end 
through  mere  human  activity ;  and  since  it  can  be  accomplished 
in  no  other  way,  we  call  in  the  intervention  of  God,  and  feel  as 
if  such  an  intervention  were  necessary,  in  order  to  the  harmony 
and  completeness  of  the  plans  of  God  at  present  in  operation. 

Some  of  these  considerations  may  be  regarded  as  brought  from 
a  distance ;  yet  by  their  collection,  and  clustering,  they  seem  to 
us  to  form  a  pleasant  belt  of  light — a  kind  of  milky-way,  hung 
over  our  world,  in  this  its  dark  night,  to  give  light  to  the  traveller 
who  has  set  out  in  search  of  truth. 

SECTION  II— WHAT  IS  NEEDFUL  IN  ORDER  TO  THE  RESTORATION  OF 
MAN— (1.)  IN  RELATION  TO  THE  CHARACTER  OF  GOD. 

We  feel  now  as  if  we  had  firmer  ground  to  stand  on.  It  is  diffi- 
cult to  prove  a  priori,  that  God  should  interpose  for  the  rectifica- 
tion of  his  own  government,  and  the  improvement  of  human  char- 
acter. There  is  less  difficulty  in  fixing  on  the  points  which  re- 
quire vindication. 

The  gospel  professes  to  be  remedial,  and  remedial  of  an  evil 
affecting  the  laws  of  God,  and  the  character  and  condition  of 
man.  It  is  in  its  reference  to  the  Divine  government  that  we  are 
to  discover,  if  indeed  we  can  discover  anywhere,  its  appropriate- 
ness. Now,  we  find  the  plan  of  redemption  fitted  in  every  par- 
ticular to  meet  the  evils  existing  in  the  world,  as  these  present 
themselves  to  an  earnest  and  thoughtful  mind.  This  adaptation 
furnishes  one  of  the  highest  of  all  the  internal  arguments  in  favor 
of  Christianity.  There  may  be  an  argument  derived  from  the 
beauty  of  the  style,  so  much  superior  to  what  might  be  expected 
from  Hebrew  shepherds  and  Galilean  fishermen ;  and  an  argu- 
ment from  the  heavenly  elevation  and  purity  of  the  morality ;  but 
'ihere  may  be  an  argument  of  a  still  higher  order  obtained  from 
die  fitness  of  the  whole  scheme  in  its  reference  to  the  government 


WHAT    IS    NEEDFUL    IN    ORDER    TO' 

of  God  and  the  state  of  mankind.  That  these  excellencies  should' 
all  have  met  in  a  cunningly  devised  fable  of  certain  Hebrew 
writers,  is  a  supposition  vastly  more  improbable  than  that  the  re- 
ligion should  have  descended  from  heaven.  Those  who  ridicule 
the  alleged  credulity  of  the  Christian,  are  themselves  obliged  'to 
yield  their  assent  to  the  most  monstrous  incredibilities. 

Nature  cannot  tell  beforehand  how  a  Divine  intervention  is  to 
accomplish  its  object,  for  that  intervention  must  be  beyond  nature, 
beyond  all  its  findings  and  experience.  It  can  announce,  however, 
that  if  it  meets  the  clamant  evils,  it  must  be  of  a  twofold  charac- 
ter, corresponding  to  the  twofold  derangement. 

FlRST,  THERE  MUST  BE  A  PROVISION  FOR  VINDICATING  THE 
DIVINE  GOVERNMENT,  DISHONORED  BY  THE  REBELLION  OF  THE 
CREATURE,  AND  THIS  IN  ACCORDANCE  WITH  THE  CHARACTER 
OF  GOD.  THEN,  SECONDLY,  THERE  MUST  BE  A  PROVISION  FOR 

RECTIFYING    THE    HEART    AND  NATURE    OF    MAN.       The  first  of 

these  is  found  in  the  righteousness  and  sufferings  of  the  Mediator. 
as  giving  glory  to  God,  and  effecting  a  reconciliation  ;  and  the 
second  is  found  in  the  inward  operation  of  the  Sanctifier.  In  the' 
one,  God's  government  is  justified  ;  and  by  the  other,  man's  char- 
acter is  sanctified. 

FlRST,  THE  INTERVENTION  MUST  PROVIDE  FOR  THE  VINDI- 
CATION OF  THE  DIVINE  GOVERNMENT. 

"  Of  law,  there  can  be  no  less  acknowledged  than  that  her  seat 
is  in  the  bosom  of  God  ^  her  voice,  the  harmony  of  the  world  ;  all' 
things  in  heaven  and  earth  do  her  homage,  the  very  least  as  feel- 
ing her  care,  and  the  greatest  as  not  exempted  from  her  power ; 
both  angels  and  creatures  of  what  condition  soever,  though  each 
in  different  sort  and  manner  admiring  her  as  the  mother  of  their 
peace  and  joy."*  If  so  much  can  be  justly  said  of  law,  what  is 
to  be  said  of  those  who  have  set  this  law  at  defiance,  and  that 
under  its  most  sacred  form,  the  form  of  moral  law? 

There  is  something  in  man's  nature  which  leads  him  to  see  and 
acknowledge,  that  in  coming  into  the  presence  of  God — that  is,  in 
transacting  with  God — he  needs  a  righteousness.  The  conscience 
intimates,  nol  to  be  sure  in  so  distinct  a  tone  as  revelation,  but  stilt 
\vii!i  sufficient  clearness  to  be  heard,  that  God,  in  calling  as  he  does 
call  his  creatures  into  judgment,  demands  of  them  that  they 
bring  an  obedience.  If  it  be  inquired  why  this  demand  is  made  ?' 
the  answer  is,  because  of  the  very  nature  and  character  of  God: 

*•  Hooker, 


THE    RESTORATION    OF    MAN.  471 

aa  a.  just  God,  and  from  the  relation  in  which  he  stands  to  his 
creatures  as  their  Governor.  It  is  because  of  this  deeply-seated 
feeling  that  there  are  such  exertions  made  by  the  thoughtful  to 
procure  such  a  righteousness ;  and  hence,  too,  the  ceremonial  ser- 
vices to  which  mankind  naturally  resort — "  Going  about  to  estab- 
lish a  righteousness  of  their  own."  Need  we  show  how  vain  the 
attempt.  The  conscience  is  in  this  respect  in  unison  with  the 
word,  and  announces  that  this  righteousness  must  be  an  obedience 
in  all  things,  at  all  times,  and  in  all  places.  Just  as  God  cannot 
accept  angel  or  man  without  obedience ;  so  he  cannot  accept  that 
obedience,  except  it  be  entire  and  complete.  Our  moral  nature,  in 
declaring  that  man  must  present  a  righteousness,  declares  farther 
that  it  must  be  pure.  The  same  attribute  of  the  Divine  character, 
which  leads  him  to  demand  obedience,  makes  him  also  demand 
that  this  obedience  be  spotless  and  perfect. 

Herein  lay  the  difficulty  of  rectifying  the  disorder  which  trans- 
gression had  introduced,  and  seeming  to  indicate  that  there  was 
no  way  of  vindicating  the  law  but  by  the  eternal  separation  of  the 
transgressor  from  God.  The  sinner,  from  the  very  circumstance 
of  his  being  a  sinner,  cannot  give  for  himself  such  an  obedience 
as  God  exacts,  and  still  less  can  he  give  it  for  a  fellow-sinner.  Nor 
can  any  other  creature  of  God  provide  such  a  righteousness  for 
him,  for  every  creature  is  required  as  for  himself  to  fulfil  the  uni- 
versal law  of  God ;  and  after  he  has  loved  the  Lord  with  all  his 
heart,  and  discharged  every  commanded  duty,  he  has  not  acquired 
any  merit  of  supererogation  which  may  be  carried  over  to  the  ac- 
count of  another.  Not  only  so,  but  it  might  seem  as  if  God  him- 
self was  precluded  from  being  able  to  provide  anything  to  suit  the 
transgressor,  and  that  his  inability  arose  from  his  very  greatness. 
The  righteousness  required  of  man  is  obedience,  and  the  only 
righteousness  which  can  be  of  any  use  to  him  must  partake  of  the 
nature  of  obedience.  But  God,  as  God,  the  author  of  the  law,  the 
governor  of  the  world,  cannot  give  obedience.  Herein,  we  repeat, 
was  the  difficulty  in  the  way  of  the  restoration  of  a  fallen  being. 
Incapable  of  redeeming  himself,  no  creature  can  possibly  have 
any  superfluous  righteousness  to  impute  to  him;  and  it  might 
seem  as  if  God  himself  could  not  provide  what  man  requires.  It 
is  when  we  consider  it  in  its  fitness  to  solve  this  difficulty  that  we 
discover  the  wisdom  of  the  "  mystery  of  godliness,  God  manifest 
iu  the  flesh."  In  order  to  provide  such  an  obedience  one  of  the 
persons  of  the  ever-existing  and  ever-blessed  Godhead  associates 


472  WHAT    IS    NEEDFUL    IN    ORDER    TO 

himself  with  humanity,  and  becomes  "obedient  even  unto  death," 
fulfilling  the  law  in  its  precepts,  and  submitting  to  its  penalty. 
How  completely  does  the  remedy  meet  the  evil,  considered  as 
affecting  the  government  of  God.  This  great  truth  is  set  forth  in 
Scripture  in  very  expressive  language,  in  which  man  is  represented 
as  justified  by  the  righteousness  of  God,  that  is,  in  the  righteous- 
ness which  God  has  provided,  and  the  deliverer  is  spoken  of  as  the 
"  Lord  our  righteousness." 

"  I  HAVE  GLORIFIED  THEE  UPON  THE  EARTH."      We  reckon  this 

language  as  very  remarkable.  It  is  full  of  meaning.  We  might 
meditate  upon  it  for  hours  or  days  and  not  exhaust  its  height  and 
its  depth,  its  length  and  its  breadth.  Gocl  had  been  dishonored  by 
the  disobedience  of  the  being  appointed  as  the  lord  of  the  earth, 
and  now  his  government  is  vindicated  and  his  justice  honored,  and 
that  on  the  very  earth  on  which  it  had  been  so  dishonored. 

We  know  not  if  God  has  been  dishonored  anywhere  throughout 
a  boundless  universe  so  much  as  he  has  been  upon  the  earth. 
Revelation,  indeed,  speaks  of  the  angels  who  fell,  but,  with  their 
exception,  we  know  not  if  any  other  creatures  of  God  in  any  other 
world  have  so  dishonored  him  by  breaking  his  commandments; 
and  in  regard  to  these  angels,  the  honor  of  God  was  instantly  vin- 
dicated by  their  being  consigned  to  punishment.  But  for  these 
four  thousand  years  which  had  run  their  course  before  the  ap- 
pointed deliverer  came  down  to  this  earth,  one  generation  of  men 
after  another  had  gone  on  dishonoring  his  name  and  breaking  his 
laws  with  apparent  impunity.  Never  had  God  been  so  dishonored 
without  an  instant  and  public  vindication  of  his  justice.  But  on 
the  very  earth  where  he  had  been  so  dishonored  is  he  now  glorified. 
This  is  done  in  the  work  of  the  appointed  substitute,  in  which  the 
law  is  magnified  and  made  honorable,  and  Divine  justice  satisfied, 
while  room  is  opened  up  for  the  fullest  manifestation  of  the  Divine 
mercy.  This  is  done  in  the  name  and  nature  of  those  who  had 
so  dishonored  God,  so  that,  as  by  man  God  has  beeen  dishonored, 
by  man  God  is  now  glorified.  All  this  is  done  at  the  very  place 
at  which  the  wickedness  of  man  had  been  so  great ;  so  that,  as 
on  the  earth  God  had  been  dishonored,  so  now  on  the  earth  God 
is  glorified. 

That  we  may  be  the  more  forcibly  impressed  with  this  exhibi- 
tion of  the  Divine  glory,  let  us  convey  ourselves  in  imagination 
into  the  heart  of  those  dark  scenes  into  which  the  Redeemer  is 
represented  as  having  entered  immediately  after  the  utterance  of 


THE    RESTORATION    OP    MAN.  473 

the  words  on  which  we  have  been  commenting.  At  the  darkest 
hour  of  that  night  a  band  of  officers,  headed  by  an  apostate 
apostle,  come  with  glaring  torches  to  apprehend  him.  His  other 
followers,  after  showing  a  momentary  courage,  speedily  abandon 
him.  He  is  now  dragged  before  the  tribunal  of  that  high-priest 
whose  office  was  representative  of  him  who  is  now  a  prisoner  at 
his  bar.  On  the  lying  testimony  of  witnesses  bribed  for  the  pur- 
pose, that  high-priest  pronounces  a  sentence  of  condemnation  on 
him  from  whom,  though  he  little  thinks  of  it,  his  office  derives  all 
its  authority.  In  the  courts  of  the  high-priest  we  hear,  mingled  with 
the  scoffs  and  jeers  of  the  multitude,  the  cursing  and  swearing  and 
open  falsehood  of  an  apostle.  He  is  now  carried  to  the  judgment 
of  the  civil  governor,  who  refers  the  decision  to  the  people,  who 
loudly  demand  that  he  should  be  exposed  to  the  most  painful  and 
humbling  of  all  deaths,  and  the  governor,  convinced  all  the  time 
of  his  innocence,  orders  him  to  be  crucified.  All  parties  take  their 
part  in  the  scene.  The  soldiers  scourge  him ;  and  as  he  moves 
along  the  streets  of  that  city  which  had  heard  his  discourses  of 
unparalleled  beauty,  and  witnessed  his  miracles  of  astonishing 
power,  the  multitude  cover  him  with  infamy.  It  is  amidst  derision 
that  he  is  nailed  to  the  accursed  tree.  His  dying  agonies  move 
no  compassion.  One  of  the  thieves  crucified  along  with  him  re- 
viles him  as  a  greater  malefactor  than  himself.  His  prayers, 
breathing  of  Divine  compassion  and  melting  love,  are  answered 
back  by  reproaches  and  scorn.  Where  else  can  such  concentrated 
wickedness  be  met  with  ?  Blindness  and  darkness  of  mind,  unbe- 
lief in  spite  of  overwhelming  evidence,  ingratitude  for  unnumbered 
favors,  injustice,  perjury,  profanity,  malignity,  unappeasable  re- 
venge, and  all  this  against  the  meekest  of  all  men — all  this  against 
God  who  is  blessed  forever.  It  might  seem  as  if  God  had  never 
been  so  insulted  and  defied.  We  wonder  not  that  the  earth  should 
have  trembled  and  shuddered  as  if  desirous  to  cast  forth  such 
wickedness  from  its  bosom.  We  wonder  not  that  the  sun  should 
have  hid  his  face  as  unable  to  look  on  such  a  scene,  more  horrific 
than  the  most  wicked  which  he  had  seen  in  all  his  unwearied 
rounds.  But  it  was  at  the  very  place  at  which  man  was  most  dis- 
honoring God  that  his  representative  was  glorifying  Him.  Where 
man  was  exhibiting  the  most  appalling  wickedness,  there  his  sure- 
ty was  giving  the  most  signal  display  of  goodness.  Where  man, 
breaking  loose  from  all  restraint,  was  abandoning  himself  to  open 
rebellion,  there  his  substitute  was  becoming  obedient  even  unto 


474  WHAT    IS    NEEDFUL    IN    ORDER   TO 

death.  Where  the  wildest  passions  that  ever  stirred  the  human 
heart  were  raging  uncontrolled,  there  one  in  our  own  name  and 
nature  was  giving  the  most  moving  display  of  a  tenderness  which 
could  not  be  ruffled,  and  a  love  which  could  not  be  quenched. 
Where  sin  abounded,  there  righteousness  did  much  more  abound. 
The  representative  is  lifted  high  upon  the  cross  that  he  might  be- 
come a  spectacle,  and  in  the  view  of  all  men,  and  in  the  view  of 
wondering  angels,  and  in  the  view  of  God,  glorify  God,  wherein 
he  had  been  most  dishonored. 

We  may  now  define  and  gather  into  a  head  the  general  obser- 
vations which  have  passed  before  us. 

In  contemplating  this  world  the  thinking  mind  discovers  a  two- 
fold derangement,  and  each  presenting  itself  under  a  twofold 
aspect.  Under  one  aspect  we  observe  a  government  obviously 
orderly,  yet  filled  with  disorder.  Under  another  aspect  we  per- 
ceive man,  a  sinful  being,  covered  with  kindness,  and  yet  called 
to  give  an  account  of  his  deeds  to  a  God  who  hates  sin.  These 
four  facts  will  not  be  disputed  by  any  man  who  has  thoughtfully 
contemplated  the  world,  or  seriously  examined  his  own  nature. 
We  everywhere  meet  with  order,  and  also  with  sin,  which  is  cer- 
tainly disorder.  The  same  moral  nature  announces  to  us  that 
God  hates  sin,  and  that  man  has  sinned.  It  must  be  difficult  for 
a  reflecting  mind  to  deny  any  one  of  these  four  facts,  almost  as  dif- 
ficult as  to  deny  the  very  existence  of  God,  or  the  distinction  be- 
tween good  and  evil.  How  wonderful,  that  in  a  system  originat- 
ing in  the  sequestered  land  of  Judah  we  should  have  a  plan  in 
which  these  four  facts  are  embraced  and  reconciled,  and  the 
double  derangement  which  they  exhibit  provided  for,  and  mercy 
extended  to  the  reconciled  transgressor,  while  the  order  of  the  Di- 
vine government  is  upheld,  and  the  justice  of  God  completely 
satisfied.  That  land  shut  out  from  intercourse  with  the  rest  of 
the  world  must,  we  are  constrained  to  believe,  have  had  a  special 
communication  with  heaven. 

SECTION  III.— WHAT  IS  NEEDFUL  IN  ORDER  TO  THE  RESTORATION 
OF  MAN— (2.)  IN  ITS  RELATION  TO  THE  CHARACTER  OF  MAN; 
THE  NEED  OF  AN  INTERPOSITION  IN  THE  HUMAN  HEART  AND 
CHARACTER. 

The  need  of  such  an  interposition,  in  order  to  the  rectification 
of  a  clamant  evil,  becomes  visible  whether  we  look  at  society  at 
large,  or  inspect  our  own  bosoms. 


THE    RESTORATION    OF    MAN.  475 

The  infidel  writers  of  last  century  were  wont,  in  furtherance  of 
the  objects  which  they  had  in  view,  to  represent  savage  life  as  one 
of  spotless  innocence  and  perfect  peace.  The  visits  of  travellers, 
sufficiently  shrewd  to  look  beneath  the  surface,  have  served  to 
dispel  the  illusion,  and  to  demonstrate  that  there  is  more  cun- 
ning and  deceit,  and  as  much  selfishness  and  malignity  among 
rude  as  among  civilized  nations. 

Again,  there  are  persons  who  announce,  with  oracular  authority, 
that  advancing  civilization  will  change  the  very  character  of  so- 
ciety. They  forget  that  increasing  knowledge,  while  it  holds  out 
new  encouragements  to  excellence,  also  furnishes  additional  in- 
struments and  facilities  to  all  that  is  evil.  The  art  of  printing,  for 
instance,  through  which  useful  knowledge  is  disseminated,  is  also 
the  medium  through  which  scandal,  vice,  and  irreligion  propagate 
themselves ;  and  this  they  are  doing,  to  an  incredible  extent,  in 
this  our  country  in  the  present  day,  for  we  read  of  the  millions  of 
noxious  publications  which  annually  issue  from  the  press.  The 
rapid  modes  of  travelling  and  communication  which  modern  times 
enjoy,  and  which  enable  the  good  to  exercise  a  wider  influence, 
admit  at  the  same  time  of  the  more  effectual  and  speedy  trans- 
mission of  all  that  is  corrupt,  and  baleful,  and  infectious.  We  re- 
quire only  to  open  our  eyes,  and  not  to  shut  our  ears,  to  discover 
vice  presenting  itself  in  as  unabashed  and  disgusting  an  aspect, 
and  vice  uttering  as  blasphemous  words  in  the  present  as  in  any 
other  age  of  the  world.  In  some  respects,  indeed,  civilization  has 
reformed  the  outward  man,  whitened  the  outside  of  the  sepulchre, 
but  it  has  left  it  within  as  full  of  corruption  as  before. 

The  inhabitant  of  some  busy  town,  wearied  with  its  prevailing 
artifice  and  selfishness,  its  competitions  in  trade  and  rivalships  in 
rank  and  family,  repairs  for  a  season  to  some  sequestered  village 
or  secluded  glen  ;  and  the  peace  and  serenity  that  reign  around 
him,  the  absence  of  all  turmoil  and  open  crime,  leave  upon  him  the 
impression  that  the  character  of  the  inhabitants  is  as  lovely  as  are 
the  works  of  God  among  which  they  dwell.  Alas  !  he  needs  only 
a  little  deeper  acquaintance  with  those  who  seem  so  innocent  and 
simple  to  find  the  same  passions  at  work,  and  the  same  feuds  and 
jealousies  as  in  the  bustling  city  population.  The  countryman 
repays  the  visit  of  the  citizen  at  a  different  season,  and  is  sur- 
prised and  delighted  with  the  comfort,  the  elegance,  the  courtesy 
and  apparent  affection  which  everywhere  fall  under  his  view.  It 
requires  some  little  inquiry  to  discover  that  pride,  vanity,  and  un- 


476  WHAT    IS    NEEDFUL    IN    ORDER    TO 

godliness,  are  beating  and  reigning  in  bosoms  so  decked  and  adorned 
as  to  conceal  every  rankling  passion  within.  Should  he  go  forth 
from  the  narrow  precincts  of  the  refined  into  the  haunts  of  the 
lowest  portions  of  our  cities,  he  will  find  his  sensibility  affected  by 
deeper  sinks  of  iniquity  than  are  to  be  found  in  any  previous  age 
of  the  world's  history. 

All  classes  of  men  bear,  if  we  but  narrowly  examine  them,  the 
traces  of  their  common  lineage.  You  may  discover  them  to  belong 
to  the  race  by  their  sins  and  passions,  as  well  as  by  their  bodily 
frames  and  common  features.  This  common  nature  breaks  forth 
and  exhibits  itself  in  each  individual.  The  fond  mother,  as  she 
rocks  her  child  to  rest  on  her  bosom,  or  plays  herself  with  its  play- 
fulness, is  tempted  to  think  that  one  so  engaging  can  never  be 
torn  by  wild  passions.  Yet  it  is  most  certain  that  this  child  will 
no  sooner  begin  to  act  as  a  moral  and  responsible  being  than  it 
will  show  an  evil  heart.  That  child  grown  up  to  youth,  and  en- 
grossed with  the  objective  world  as  it  dances  before  the  eye,  and 
seldom  looking  down  into  the  dark  subjective,  is  just  as  unaware 
as  the  mother  was  of  the  wickedness  slumbering  within,  till  per- 
haps it  has  carried  him  to  a  length  at  which  he  feels  how  far  he 
is  from  innocence,  and  yet  feels  that  his  retreat  is  cut  off,  and 
that  there  is  nothing  for  him  but  to  advance. 

The  remedy  to  such  evils  in  order  to  be  effectual,  must  be  a 
universal  remedy  admitting  of  application  to  all  ranks  of  men  and 
stages  of  society,  to  poor  and  rich,  savage  and  civilized.  If  one 
of  these  classes  require  it,  it  can  be  shown,  by  a  like  reason,  that 
all  the  others  require  it.  Society,  as  it  advances,  opens  up  more 
exquisite  pleasures,  but  it  brings,  too,  more  exquisite  pain  ;  it  mul- 
tiplies enjoyments,  but  it  multiplies  sorrow  also  ;  it  kindles  hopes, 
but  it  often  quenches  them  amidst  fearful  anguish.  Our  readers 
may  be  reminded  of  that  fine  passage  in  which  Burke  speaks  of 
the  pity  which  we  should  feel  for  the  "  distresses  of  the  miserable 
great,"  and  the  "  fat  stupidity  and  gross  ignorance  concerning 
what  imports  men  most  to  know,  which  prevails  at  courts,  and  at 
the  head  of  armies,  and  in  senates,  as  much  as  at  the  loom  and  in 
the  field."  "  They,  too,  are  among  the  unhappy.  They  feel  per- 
sonal pain  and  domestic  sorrow.  In  these  they  have  no  privilege, 
but  are  subject  to  pay  their  full  contingent  to  the  contributions 
levied  on  mortality.  They  want  this  sovereign  balm  under  their 
gnawing  cares  and  anxieties  which,  being  less  conversant  about 
the  limited  wants  of  animal  life,  range  without  limit,  and  are  di- 


THE    RESTORATION    OF    MAN.  477 

versified  by  infinite  combinations  in  the  wild  and  unbounded 
regions  of  imagination.  Some  charitable  dole  is  wanting  to  these 
our  often  very  unhappy  brethren  to  fill  the  gloomy  void  that  reigns 
in  minds  which  have  nothing  on  earth  to  hope  or  fear  ;  something 
to  relieve  in  the  killing  languor  and  over-labored  lassitude  of  those 
who  have  nothing  to  do  ;  something  to  excite  an  appetite  to  exist- 
ence in  the  pallid  satiety  which  attends  on  all  pleasures  which 
may  be  bought ;  where  nature  is  not  left  to  her  own  process, 
where  even  desire  is  anticipated,  and  therefore  fruition  defeated  by 
meditated  schemes  and  contrivances  of  delight,  and  no  interval, 
no  obstacle  is  interposed  between  the  wish  and  the  accomplish- 
ment." Every  one  who  has  read  the  lives  of  the  poets,  and  other 
persons  possessed  of  that  fearful  gift,  the  gift  of  genius,  knows  that 
minds  finely  and  tensely  strung  are  fully  as  liable  to  be  deranged 
as  others,  and  need  no  less  than  those  who  are  exposed  to  the 
temptations  of  wealth  and  rank,  the  application  of  this  soothing 
medicament. 

But  in  order  to  discover  the  real  depths  of  human  depravity, 
and  the  extent  of  human  helplessness,  we  must,  look  beyond  the 
mere  outward  action  into  the  heart.  It  has  been  most  mercifully 
enacted  that  no  man  can  look  directly  into  the  heart  of  another  , 
but  it  has  been  most  wisely  provided  that  every  man  can  look 
into  his  own  heart,  and  he  is  so  far  entitled  to  take  it  as  a  type 
or  representative  of  our  common  nature.  Now,  no  man  can 
look  carefully  into  his  own  nature  without  being  constrained  to 
admit  that  he  needs  strength  higher  than  his  own  to  enable  him 
to  keep  the  law  of  God. 

But  if  there  be  a  person  under  an  impression  that  he  can  of 
himself  fulfil  the  will  of  God  apart  from  supernatural  aid,  we  in- 
vite him  to  make  the  experiment.  Let  him  determine  to  perform 
all  his  duty,  and  walk  forever  in  the  light  of  purity,  and  all  by 
his  own  strength  of  resolution. 

And  here  we  at  once  admit  that  there  is  much  which  this  man 
can  do  of  himself.  He  may  perform  the  ordinary  business  of  life, 
discharge  the  courtesies  of  kind  and  obliging  neighborhood,  and 
attend  to  the  mere  external  forms  and  observances  of  religion. 
He  may  succeed  in  doing  many  a  deed  of  kindness  to  a  neighbor, 
and  in  refraining  from  acts  of  open  immorality,  and  may  acquire 
the  habit  of  uttering  a  cold  and  formal  prayer  morning  and  even- 
ing. Some  have  attained  to  a  character  so  becoming,  that  the 
most  jealous  and  prying  eye  cannot  detect  in  it  a  single  outside 


478  WHAT    IS    NEEDFUL    IN    ORDER   TO 

blemish.  They  have  become  as  righteous  as  the  straitest  of  th« 
sect  of  the  Pharisees,  with  no  charity,  but  still  with  the  most  per- 
fect correctness;  with  no  meekness  or  humility,  but  still  with  the 
sternest  rigidity. 

But  let  it  be  remembered,  that  there  is  something  more  than 
this  requisite,  in  order  to  our  fulfilling  the  law  yf  God.  For  the 
law  is  on  this  wise — that  a  man  love  the  Lord  with  all  his  heart, 
and  that  he  love  his  neighbor  as  himself;  and  that  he  live  habitu- 
ally under  the  influence  of  these  affections,  and  others  flowing 
from  them,  and  obligatory  upon  him  as  duties  in  the  condition  in 
which  man  finds  himself.  Let  the  person  who  is  inclined  to  make 
the  supposed  experiment  ponder  this  law  in  its  purity  and  extent, 
and  the  probability  is,  that  previous  to  making  the  attempt,  he 
will  be  oppressed  with  its  utter  hopelessness. 

But  there  is  a  self-confident  man  not  so  easily  appalled  by  diffi- 
culties. Well,  let  him  make  the  attempt,  and  let  us  watch  him 
as  he  does  so.  Let  him  resolve  to  create  this  supreme  love  which 
he  owes  to  his  Creator,  and  the  other  kindred  spiritual  dispersions. 
For  this  purpose,  he  seats  himself  in  the  quiet  and  retirement  of 
his  closet,  and  resolves  that  he  will  induce  or  compel  himself  to 
love  the  Lord  with  all  his  heart.  Knowing  that  it  is  conception 
that  determines  feeling,  he  calls,  up  an  image  of  God.  First,  he 
pictures  a  being  of  awful  majesty  and  infinite  power,  and  cor- 
responding feelings  of  awe  and  wonder  rise  up  in  his  mind. 
Again,  he  represents  God  as  delighting  in  the  happiness  of  his 
creatures,  and  for  an  instant  there  is  a  pleasing  emotion  playing 
upon  the  surface  of  his  mind,  and  he  begins  to  imagine  that  he 
has  been  successful.  But  suppose  that  the  idea  of  the  holiness 
of  the  Divine  nature,  shining  in  all  its  dazzling  splendor,  now 
riseg  up  before  the  mind,  and  the  person  feels  himself  to  be  a  sin- 
ner in  immediate  contact  with  this  searching  light : — we  venture 
to  affirm,  that  the  contemplation  will  become  less  pleasant,  and 
that  the  individual,  writhing  under  an  unpleasant  inspection,  will 
be  tempted  to  turn  away  to  other  and  less  holy,  and  therefore 
more  pleasing  topics  ;  or  his  love  will  be  turned  into  slavish  fear, 
and  he  will  scarcely  dare  to  gaze  any  longer  upon  this  focus  of 
light  in  the  heavens — and  all  the  brighter  the  beams,  he  will  be 
the  readier  to  turn  away  his  eye  to  the  lower,  and  what  is  to  him 
the  lovelier  and  greener  scenery  of  this  earth ;  or  if  in  obstinate 
determination  he  still  continue  to  gaze,  then  we  venture  to  affirm 
that  the  very  light  shall  appear  as  darkness — as  when  the  eyn 


THE    RESTORATION   OP   MAN.  479 

gazes  long  on  the  sun,  he  becomes  shorn  of  his  greatness  and 
grandeur,  and  is  seen  a  blank  and  uninteresting  surface. 

Such  must  ever  be  the  fruitless  and  lamentable  issue  of  all  at- 
tempts to  create  spiritual  affection  to  a  spiritual  God.  The  man 
may  say,  let  there  be  light ;  but  no  light  will  arise.  The  result 
will  be  the  same  should  the  experimenter  attempt  the  performance 
of  any  of  the  specific  duties  which  he  owes  to  God.  But  if  he  is 
not  convinced,  let  him  make  the  effort,  and  the  failure  will  tend 
to  subdue  him  into  humility,  and  give  him  a  deeper  sense  of  the 
coldness  and  ungodliness  of  his  heart.  Let  him  resolve  to  repent 
of  his  sins  ;  and  for  this  purpose  he  would  call  up  his  sins.  Alas  ! 
it  may  only  be  to  find  the  treacherous  memory  dwelling,  rather 
on  the  good  qualities  that  are  supposed  to  make  amends  for  tha 
sins,  or  the  soul  fixing  itself  on  the  pleasures  which  the  sins  have 
conveyed,  and  so  tempted  anew  to  the  commission  of  them.  Oi 
let  him  resolve  to  pray  as  in  duty  bound,  and  he  will  find,  even 
while  the  words  proceed  from  his  lips,  that  his  heart  is  blank  and 
void  ;  and  there  is  the  attitude,  without  the  feeling  of  reverence — 
the  prostration  of  the  body,  without  the  humiliation  of  the  soul. 
He  may  bring  the  sacrifice  to  the  altar,  as  the  priests  of  Baal  did 
on  Mount  Carmel ;  but  apart  from  the  opening  of  heaven  to  let 
down  an  influence,  he  will  be  as  little  capable  of  kindling  it,  aa 
the  priests  referred  to  by  cutting  their  bodies  could  bring  down 
fire,  which  at  once  descended  to  the  prayer  of  Elijah. 

Such  considerations  'as  these  should  show,  that  as  spiritual  dis- 
positions do  not  spring  up  spontaneously  in  the  breast,  so  neither 
can  they  be  forced.  And  if  they  refuse  to  give  their  momentary 
presence  when  called,  what  reason  have  we  to  think  that  they  will 
abide  ?  And  yet  it  is  required,  not  only  that  we  entertain  them 
at  certain  times,  as  when  a  present  object  calls  them  forth,  as 
when  in  a  temple  of  God,  and  listening  to  a  discourse  on  an  ex- 
citing topic,  or  to  music  which  causes  our  feelings  to  rise  or  fall 
with  its  notes,  but  that  they  be  cherished  habitually,  and  become 
the  guiding  principles  of  the  life.  Let  it  be  supposed,  for  the  sake 
of  argument,  that  our  experimenter  has  raised  a  momentary  love 
to  God  by  the  force  of  native  resolution  ;  or  what  may  very  possi- 
bly be,  that  he  is  temporarily  under  the  influence  of  high  religious 
emotion.  The  question  now  is,  will  these  feelings  continue  ?  If 
it  be  difficult  to  kindle  the  spark,  it  will  be  found  still  more  difficult 
to  preserve  it  from  being  extinguished  by  every  burst  of  earthly 
passion.  There  are  times,  no  doubt,  when  there  is  a  fervor  natu 


480  WHAT    IS    NEEDFUL    IN   ORDER   TO 

rally  produced  by  the  atmosphere  in  which  he  happens  to  be 
placed ;  but  there  is  a  risk  that  his  emotional  temperature  will 
sink  as  he  goes  into  a  different  and  colder  atmosphere,  as  instantly 
as  his  bodily  temperature  when  he  has  gone  out  of  a  warm  apart- 
ment into  the  chill  of  a  frosty  night.  Every  careful  observer  of 
humankind  knows,  that  there  are-  certain  minds  which,  like  mir- 
rors, reflect  the  object  passing  before  them,  but  only  so  long  as  it 
passes  before  them.  When  full  under  some  heavenly  truths,  the 
emotions  produced  are  lovely  as  those  images  of  rocks  and  trees 
and  clouds,  which  we  have  seen  reflected  on  the  bosom  of  a  tran- 
quil lake — beautiful  while  they  last,  but  removed  by  the  first 
ruffling  of  the  passing  breeze.  Not  only  so,  but  in  the  natural 
recoil  and  collapse  there  is  a  possibility  that  the  high  excitement 
may  speedily  terminate  in  apathy  or  in  enmity.  The  flame, 
beautiful  while  it  lasts,  dies  down,  and  nothing  but  ashes  remain. 
There  are  tides  in  human  feeling,  just  as  there  are  tides  in  the 
ocean ;  and  because  the  tide  is  flowing  now,  this  is  no  evidence 
of  its  continuing  to  flow — we  may  rather  fear  that  it  will  soon 
ebb  and  recede.  The  man  feels  a  momentary  interest  in  religion, 
and  he  becomes  vain  in  the  thought  that  it  is  to  continue ;  and 
this  very  vanity  becomes  the  passage  that  leads  him  away  to  a 
quite  different  temper.  To-day  he  weeps  over  his  sins  ;  and  be- 
fore he  is  aware  of  it,  he  is  rejoicing  in  iniquity  on  the  morrow. 
His  efforts,  even  when  they  seem  to  be  successful,  are  merely  like 
the  rippling  on  the  surface  made  by  winds  opposed  to  the  current ; 
they  have  indeed  a  slight  effect,  and  may  make  the  careless  spec- 
tator imagine  that  the  stream  is  flowing  in  an  opposite  direction ; 
but  meanwhile  the  current  beneath  is  flowing  on  in  its  proper 
course  as  determinedly  as  ever.  All  this  shows,  that  while  man 
by  his  unaided  strength  may  rise  a  little  above  his  habitual  level 
of  earthliness,  yet  that  he  cannot  soar  to  the  heavenly  regions  of 
purity  and  peace ;  and  that  if  he  seek,  Icarus-like,  to  rise  by 
earthly  means,  his  flight  may  only  make  his  fall  the  more  lament- 
able. 

"  The  most  difficult  of  tasks  to  keep, 
Heights  which  the  soul  is  competent  to  gain." — WORDSWORTH. 

Nor  is  our  argument  exhausted.  The  difficulties  are  seen  to  be 
immeasurably  increased,  when  we  consider  that  man  has  not  only 
holy  dispositions  to  cultivate,  but  sinful  dispositions  to  conquer. 
The  carnal  thoughts  and  feelings  that  are  to  be  found  in  such 


THE    RESTORATION    OF    MAN.  481 

rank  luxuriance,  all  spring  up  with  a  native  and  sptntaneoua 
power.  We  think  that  we  have  succeeded,  at  some  particular 
time,  in  cutting  them  down  ;  but  like  noxious  weeds,  whose  roots 
are  interwoven  with  the  soil,  and  whose  seeds  are  scattered  though- 
out  it,  when  cut  down  in  one  quarter,  they  speedily  spring  up  in 
another.  But  should  there  be  some  one,  confident  that  he  can 
subdue  them  all  in  his  own  strength,  we  encourage  him  to  make 
the  effort.  Let  him  say  to  his  unruly  thoughts  and  passions,  thus 
far  but  no  farther,  and  here  shall  thy  proud  waves  be  stayed,  and 
mark  if  the  waters  will  roll  back  at  his  command.  There  will  be 
times  indeed,  when  removed  from  excitement  and  temptation,  he 
may  think  that  he  is  succeeding';  at  their  natural  ebb,  the  waters 
may  seem  to  be  obeying  him,  and  fleeing  as  if  in  terror.  But 
when  they  begin  to  flow  in  full  tide,  he  will  not  be  able  to  master 
them  ;  and  they  will  roll  over  him,  with  as  little  regard  to  his  com- 
mands as  the  waves  once  rolled  over  the  feet  of  the  Saxon  monarch, 
who  showed  the  courtiers,  who  sought  to  give,  him  too  exalted  an 
idea  of  his  power,  how  little  control  he  had  over  nature  without 
him  by  an  experiment  not  unlike  that  which  we  have  instituted 
to  show  how  little  control  we  have  over  nature  within  us. 

This  evil,  then,  the  evil  of  man's  inability  to  raise  himself,  we 
find  pressing  upon  our  notice  in  all  directions ;  and  to  meet  it,  we 
find  the  revealed  redemption  proffering  the  supernatural  aid  of  the 
Spirit  of  God. 


SECTION  IV.— SAME  SUBJECT  CONTINUED— MEANS  OF  APPLYING 

THE  AID. 

We  are  now  to  mark  the  appropriateness  of  the  method  in 
which  the  aid  is  dispensed.  It  is  in  admirable  adaptation  to  the 
constitution  of  man.  The  four  indestructible  principles  in  the  hu- 
man agent  are — the  REASON,  the  CONSCIENCE,  the  AFFECTIONS, 
and  the  WILL  ;  and  let  us  observe  the  manner  in  which  each  of 
these  is  addressed. 

I.  The  REASON  is  addressed.  We  are  required  to  believe,  but 
to  believe  on  evidence.  This  evidence  is  partly  external,  arising 
from  miracles  properly  attested  and  the  fulfilment  of  prophecy,  and 
partly,  indeed  chiefly,  internal,  being  such  adaptations  as  those  we 
are  now  considering,  many  of  them  being  as  wonderful  and  con- 
clusive as  those  brought  to  prove  the  existence  of  God.  In  this 
the  Christian  religion  stands  alone.  There  are  persons  who  talk 

31 


482  WHAT    IS    NEEDFUL    IN    ORDER    TO 

of  the  rivalry  of  religions  as  an  excuse  for  adopting  none,  but  in? 
this  respect  there  is  no  rivalry.  Other  religions,  Pagan  or  Ma- 
homedan,  claim  the  beliefs  of  their  votaries,  on  the  ground  of  mere 
authority  or  descent  from  ancestors,  of  terror  or  blind  feeling.  Of 
all  religions,  Christianity  is  the  only  one  which  professes  to  be 
founded  on  evidence,  and  which  is- at  pains  to  furnish  it. 

II.  The  CONSCIENCE.  (1.)  The  conscience  is  pacified.  Con- 
science, we  have  seen,  is  a  reflex  faculty,  judging  of  action  pre- 
sented to  it.  Sin  presented  to  it  as  sin,  it  must  ever  condemn. 
The  sinner  finds  little  difficulty  in  deadening  it,  at  least  at  times, 
by  presenting  sin  under  a  false  aspect.  But  to  pacify  the  con- 
science, to  give  it  real  and  deep  satisfaction,  this  surpasses  the 
utmost  exertions  of  human  ingenuity.  And  yet,  without  such  a 
satisfaction,  the  conscience  will  ever  crave  ;  or  if  occasionally  lulled 
into  slumber,  it  is  only  that  it  may  awake  in  renewed  vigor.  Re- 
pentance, we  have  seen,  cannot  appease,  nor  can  self-inflicted  tor- 
tures appease  it — they  merely  indicate  that  the  mind  is  writhing 
with  pain.  In  order  to  the  pacifying  of  the  conscience,  there  must 
be  clear  evidence  that  God  is  pacified.  The  attempts  made  in 
superstition  under  all  its  forms  show  that  the  human  mind  feels 
that  God  is  offended,  and  that  it  is  needful  to  provide  a  satisfac- 
tion. The  conscience  in  telling  us  that  we  have  sinned,  announces 
that  God  is  holy  and  cannot  overlook  sin.  The  conscience  which 
so  pains  us  when  we  look  to  our  sins,  also  pains  us  when  we 
spread  out  our  sins  before  God.  Nor  will  it  be  satisfied  with  a 
declaration  that  God  takes  no  notice  of  sin,  or  that  he  will  over- 
look it.  Such  a  declaration  would  only  puzzle  and  perplex  the 
mind,  as  landing  it  in  a  seeming  contradiction.  The  announce- 
ment that  God  overlooks  sin,  would  ever  be  met  by  a  counter 
announcement,  that  God  cannot  overlook  it.  Human  art  has  not 
been  able  to  reconcile  this  contradiction  :  and  so  it  has  never  suc- 
ceeded in  doing  more  than  deceiving  the  conscience,  which  is  the 
readier  to  take  its  revenge  when  the  deception  is  detected.  But 
if  it  is  needful,  as  every  one  admits,  in  order  to  the  pacifying  of 
the  conscience  that  God  be  pacified,  it  seems  equally  necessary,  in 
order  to  its  satisfaction,  that  a  ground  be  presented,  on  which  God 
can  be  satisfied  in  consistency  with  the  holiness  of  his  character. 
In  every  system  of  proffered  mercy  in  which  no  such  provision  is 
made,  a  double  voice  will  be  heard,  as  it  were,  ringing  in  the  ear, 
— the  one  saying,  God  is  pleased  ;  the  other  saying,  God  is  angry  j 
and  the  mind,  instead  of  being  at  peace,  will  be  distracted  between 


THE    RESTORATION    OP    MAN.  483 

Every  view  which  we  take  of  God  under  such  a  system 
will,  as  it  were,  present  an  incongruity;  and  the  conscience,  in 
spite  of  all  the  endeavors  of  the  feelings,  will  not  be  satisfied — nay, 
will  at  times  be  positively  dissatisfied. 

Let  -us  mark,  then,  how  in  the  gospel  system  God  is  represented 
as  pacified,  and  pacified  in  strict  accordance  with  the  maintenance 
of  justice.  Under  it,  our  moral  nature  is  oppressed  with  no  sense 
of  incongruity,  when  it  is  declared  that  sin  is  forgiven.  We  be- 
lieve not  only  that  the  heart  is  melted  by  the  expression  of  the 
Divine  tenderness,  but  that  our  moral  nature  is  made  to  approve 
of  God,  and  entertains  a  more  exalted  conception  than  ever  of  his 
unbending  rectitude.  On  the  scheme  being  presented,  and  on 
the  understanding  being  convinced  that  it  has  the  sanction  of 
heaven,  the  conscience,  the  feelings  are  satisfied — the  whole  soul 
is  satisfied. 

It  is  in  this  light  that  God  is  everywhere  represented  in  the 
Scriptures.  From  the  day  on  which  man  fell,  God  is  ever  pre- 
sented to  man  under  the  double  aspect  of  a  just  God  and  a  great 
Saviour.  The  sentences  pronounced  on  the  guilty  parties  in  Eden, 
tell  of  an  offended  God,  who  has  however  provided  a  means  of  re- 
conciliation. Sacrifices  from  henceforth  become  an  essential  part 
of  all  acceptable  worship ;  and  in  them  the  worshipper,  laying  his 
hand  on  the  animal,  devotes  it  to  destruction  in  his  room  and 
stead,  in  acknowledgment  that  he  himself  deserves  to  die,  and  yet 
in  confident  expectation  of  forgiveness  through  a  substitute.  The 
ancient  Jew  prayed  morning  and  evening  with  his  face  towards 
the  tabernacle  or  temple  in  which  the  lamb  was  being  offered  in 
sacrifice,  and  this  in  token  of  his  belief  in  the  means  by  which  his 
person  and  services  were  accepted.  The  types  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment are  still  employed  in  the  New  Testament  as  means  of  com- 
municating instruction,  and  serve  the  same  purpose  as  pictures 
and  symbols  in  a  skilfully  taught  elementary  school.  The  Old 
Testament  is  not  superseded  by  the  New.  The  one  is  a  prepara- 
tion for  the  other,  not  only  historically,  but  also  to  some  extent 
morally,  in  the  training  of  the  mind  of  the  disciple.  Introduce  the 
reader  into  the  New  Testament  untutored  by  the  Old,  and  he  will 
feel  a  difficulty  in  grasping  several  of  its  truths.  There  is  a  great 
depth  of  meaning  in  the  saying  of  an  apostle,  that  the  law  is  our 
schoolmaster  to  bring  us  unto  Christ.  Besides  supplying  a  body 
and  a  life  to  our  conceptions,  the  Old  Testament  ordinances  posi- 
tively give  us  some  of  the  conceptions  themselves.  "  Throughout 


484  .  WHAT    IS    NEEDFUL    IN    ORDER   TO 

the  whole  Levitical  economy,  the  idea  of  purity  pervaded  all  its 
ceremonies  and  observances.  The  camp  was  purified,  the  people 
were  purified,  everything  was  purified  and  repurified  ;  and  each 
process  of  the  ordinance  was  designed  to  reflect  purity  on  the 
others;  until  finally  that  idea  of  purity,  formed  in  the  mind  and 
rendered  intense  by  the  convergence  of  so  many  rays,  was  by  com- 
parison referred  to  the  idea  of  God,  and  the  idea  of  God  in  their 
minds  being  that  of  an  infinitely  powerful  and  good  spirit :  hence, 
purity  as  a  characteristic  or  attribute  of  such  a  nature,  would 
necessarily  assume  a  moral  aspect,  because  it  appertained  to  a 
moral  being,  would  become  moral  purity  or  'holiness.  This  they 
learned  in  the  sentiment  of  Scripture,  that  God  was  of  too  pure 
eyes  to  look  upon  iniquity."* 

We  have  seen  that,  the  conscience  decides  according  to  the  view 
presented  to  it.  Hence  the  importance  of  right  conception,  in 
order  to  the  satisfying  of  the  conscience.  Hence  the  pains  which 
God  took  to  raise  a  people  in  ancient  times — the  Israelites,  for 
instance,  just  delivered  from  bondage  in  Egypt — to  correct  views 
of  God,  and  the  relation  in  which  they  stood  to  him.  All  that  train- 
ing through  which  they  were  put,  has  been  handed  down  to  us  as- 
a  legacy,  in  much  the  same  way  as  the  discoveries  in  science  and 
the  arts  are  handed  down  from  one  age  to  another.  We  become 
trained,  as  it  were,  in  their  training,  and  all  that  we  may  rise  to 
correct  conceptions  of  the  character  of  God,  and  of  the  relation 
subsisting  between  him  and  man.  We  confidently  affirm  that  no 
other  conception  of  the  Divine  character  can  satisfy  all  the  essen- 
tial parts  of  the  constitution  which  God  hath  given  to  man,  can- 
satisfy  at  once  the  conscience  and  the  heart. 

Such  is  the  view  presented  in  the  earliest  revelation  which  God 
gave  of  himself.  In  the  New  Testament,  the  same  view  is  ex- 
hibited, but  much  more  clearly  ;  and  we  have  "  Jesus  Christ  evi- 
dently set  forth  as  crucified,"  and  God  displayed  in  "  the  face  of 
his  Son."  "The  only  begotten  Son,  which  is  in  the  bosom  of  the 
Father,  he  hath  declared  him." 

So  far  as  we  are  under  the  faith  of  the  New  Testament,  we 
cannot  look  up  to  heaven  without  discovering  an  advocate,  which 
is  Jesus  Christ  the  Righteous,  standing  at  the  right  hand  of  God7 
or  a  lamb  before  the  throne.  We  have  this  very  strikingly  ex- 
hibited in  the  latest  revelation  which  God  has  given.  The  apostle 
who  closes  the  canon  of  Scripture  is  carried  up  in  vision  into 
*  Philosophy  of  the  Plan  of  Salvation. 


THE    RESTORATION    OF    MAN.  485 

Heaven.  He  sees  an  exalted  and  awful  throne,  surrounded  by 
angels  and  saints,  and  innumerable  living  and  immortal  beings, 
and  he  hears  the  music  which  comes  from  the  harps  of  angels 
mingling  with  the  thunders  that  issue  from  the  throne  of  God, 
and  the  very  voice  of  the  Almighty  as  it  were  the  voice  of  many 
waters.  Having  surveyed  the  scene  in  mute  astonishment,  his 
attention  is  called  to  a  book,  written  within  and  on  the  back,  and 
sealed  with  seven  seals,  containing  evidently  the  mystery  which, 
being  unfolded,  is  to  reconcile  heaven  to  earth.  A  strong  angel 
is  heard  asking  with  a  loud  voice,  which  fills  heaven  and  earth, 
"  who  is  worthy  to  open  this  book?"  An  awful  pause  ensues. 
No  one  in  heaven  or  earth,  or  throughout  the  wide  universe,  is 
able  for  the  task,  and  John  weeps  over  the  weakness  of  creation. 
While  thus  desponding,  he  is  addressed  by  one  of  the  elders  who 
compass  the  throne,  and  told  of  one  lit  for  the  mighty  work.  He 
turns  his  eyes  to  see,  and  what  does  he  behold  ?  Is  it  some  grand 
and  imposing  sight,  fitted  to  awe  and  prostrate  the  mind?  Is  it  a 
splendid  throne,  or  a  dazzling  light,  or  a  majestic  form,  or  the 
mightiest  of  the  angels  clothed  with  the  sun?  No;  as  he  looks 
he  sees  an  emblem  of  weakness  and  of  sorrow,  of  suffering  and 
of  death.  The  sight  presented  in  the  very  midst  of  the  throne 
of  God  was  of  a  "  lamb  as  it  had  been  slain." 

There  follows  a  succession  of  views  of  pictures  of  God  and  the 
Redeemed ;  and  it  is  a  remarkable  circumstance,  that  in  every  one 
of  these  descriptions,  the  same  image  is  presented  to  us  of  a  lamb, 
and  of  a  lamb  as  it  had  been  slain.  He  obtains  a  lively  view  of 
the  blessed  inhabitants  of  heaven — and  lo,  a  great  multitude 
which  no  man  could  number  out  of  all  nations,  and  kindreds,  and 
people,  and  tongues,  and  they  stand  before  the  throne  and  before 
the  lamb.  He  hears  their  praise,  and  it  is  to  God  under  the  same 
view.  "  Salvation  to  our  God  that  sitteth  upon  the  throne,  and 
unto  the  lamb."  A  question  is  put  as  to  the  past  history  of  those 
who  now  stand  in  white  robes,  and  in  possession  of  ineffable  bliss; 
it  is  said,  "They  have  washed  their  robes  and  made  them  white 
in  the  blood  of  the  lamb.1'  He  sees  them  in  the  enjoyment  of  the 
glory  provided  for  them.  '-'-  They  hunger  no  more,  neither  thirst 
any  more;  because  the  Lamb  that  is  in  the  midst  of  the  throne 
shall  feed  them,  and  lead  them  to  living  fountains  of  waters."  In 
another  passage,  John  is  represented  as  looking,  and  lo,  a  lamb 
stood  on  Mount  Zion,  and  with  him  a  great  multitude,  harping 
with  their  harps,  and  who  are  they  •  and  whence  their  joy  ?  They 


486 


WHAT    IS    NEEDFUL    TN    ORDER    TO 


are  they  "who  follow  the  Lamb,  whithersoever  he  goeth."  In  one 
of  the  closing  chapters,  we  have  a  lengthened  description  of  the 
holy  city  prepared  for  the  saints  when  this  world's  history  is  wound 
up.  Its  walls  are  of  jasper,  high  and  deep  and  wide,  with  twelve 
foundations;  its  streets  and  dwellings  are  of  pure  gold,  with  a 
foundation  of  precious  stones  ;  its-gates  are  pearls,  and  its  watch- 
men are  angels.  But  these  splendors  do  not  separately  or  conjoint- 
ly constitute  the  glory  of  heaven.  Its  chief  ornament  is  its  temple, 
and  the  Lord  God  Almighty  and  the  Lamb  are  the  temple  of  it. 
"And  the  city  hath  no  Deed  of  the  sun,  neither  of  the  moon  to 
shine  in  it,  for  the  glory  of  God  enlightens  it,  and  the  Lamb  is  the 
light  thereof."  The  sinner  is  made  to  feel  that  he  dare  not  look 
up  to  heaven,  unless  he  sees  the  Lamb  before  the  throne;  and 
that  he  is  encouraged  to  look  up  when  he  sees  God  under  this 
aspect.. 

Such  is  the  consistent  conception  of  God  which  the  Scriptures 
lead  us  to  entertain.  It  looks  as  if  it  were  the  conception  above 
all  others  (we  believe  there  is  no  other)  fitted  at  once  to  give  satis- 
faction to  our  moral  nature  and  our  sensibilities. 

(2.)  The  conscience  is  rectified.  It  is  one  of  the  most  melan- 
choly effects  of  the  corruption  of  man's  nature,  that  his  very  con- 
science has  become  bewildered.  Recognizing  in  a  general  way 
the  distinction  between  good  and  evil,  it  makes  sad  mistakes  in  its 
particular  decisions.  Conscious  to  some  extent  of  sin,  it  often* 
magnifies  the  lesser  sin,  and  sinks  the  greater  sin  out  of  sight. 
It  approves  of  what  it  calls  good  ;  but  not  un frequently  it  calls  the 
evil  good,  and  then  approves  of  it.  The  deceitful  heart  has  taught 
it  the  art  of  looking  at  the  sins  which  the  possessor  of  it  commits 
through  a  false  medium,  and  thus  enables  him  to- enjoy  an  all  but 
unbroken  self-complacency.  And  it  is  difficult  above  all  things  to 
rouse  the  conscience  from  this  its  somnolence,  through  mere  ad- 
dresses to  it  of  truth  derived  from  the  natural  conscience,  for 
against  all  such  appeals  it  hath  fortified  itself.  In  order  to  its  be- 
ing roused,  there  must  be  an  address  from  a  higher  region,  there 
must  be  a  voice  from  heaven,  recalling  it  to  its  pristine  recollections. 
Wo  have  heard  of  the  high-born  prince,  lost  and  degraded  from 
his  youth,  and  with  no  surviving  knowledge  of  his  native  gran- 
deur, having  the  memory  of  it  awakened  by  the  voice  of  a  friend, 
who  had  been  with  him  in  the  scenes  of  his  younger  years,  and 
who  recalls  incidents  which  make  the  forgotten  truth  flash  upon 
his  mind.  There  needs  such  a  voice — the  voice  of  a  pure  and 


THE    RESTORATION    OF    MAN.  487 

fooly  law,  descended  from  the  region  in  which  the  conscience  re- 
ceived its  first  instruction,  to  recall  the  conscience  to  a  sense  of  its 
present  disorder  and  primitive  destination. 

And  the  voice  which  rouses  it  must  continue  to  guide  it.  For 
never  did  it  feel  itself  so  helpless  as  now  when  it  is  awakened  to  a 
proper  sense  of  its  condition.  Before,  it  was  wandering  without 
knowing  it ;  but  now,  it  feels  itself  bewildered  as  in  a  forest,  and 
the  very  tracks  before  it  confusing  it  the  more,  for  it  knows  not 
which  one  to  choose.  It  is  ever  going  wrong,  and  knows  not' 
when  it  is  right ;  and  it  has  a  painful  feeling  of  the  need  of  some- 
thing by  which  to  regulate  itself,  and  in  accordance  with  which  it 
may  move.  The  law,  then,  has  not  only,  in  the  first  instance,  to 
arouse  the  conscience,  it  has  to  serve  the  farther  purpose  of  right- 
ing it  in  its  motions.  When  it  hath  lost  its  delicate  sensibility, 
and  its  power  of  direction,  there  seems  to  be  only  one  method  of 
restoration,  and  that  is  by  placing  it  alongside  of  a  pure  standard 
of  right  and  wrong,  as  the  magnetized  iron  which  hath  lost  its 
virtue  is  restored  by  being  bound  up  for  a  time  with  a  correctly 
pointing  magnet. 

III.  THE  AFFECTIONS  ARE  GAINED.  (1.)  Here  let  us  mark 
how  it  is  needful,  in  order  to  this,  that  the  conscience  be  appeased. 
An  evil  conscience  always  leads  the  mind  to  avoid,  as  if  instinct- 
ively, the  remembrance  of  the  party  offended.  There  cannot, 
then,  be  love  to  God  in  a  mind  in  which  conscience  has  not  been 
appeased,  nor  can  there  be  any  of  those  cognate  graces  of  faith, 
confidence,  hope,  and  joy,  which  ought  to  fill  and  animate  the 
soul.  The  appeasing  of  this  moral  avenger  is  an  indispensable 
preliminary  to  the  flowing  out  of  the  affections  towards  God.  Pro- 
vision is  made  for  this  in  the  Christian  religion,  but  ill  no  other 
religion  recommended  to  man.  The  philosophic  system  have  no 
proposed  method  of  appeasing  the  conscience.  The  more  influ- 
ential of  the  superstitions  that  have  prevailed  in  the  world  have 
felt  the  need  there  is  of  appeasing  God  and  the  conscience,  and 
have  set  man  on  a  vain  attempt  to  accomplish  this  end  by  means 
of  the  affections  which  he  cherishes  and  the  services  he  pays,  for- 
getting that  no  true  affection  will  be  cherished,  and  that  therefore 
no  acceptable  service  can  be  paid  till  first  the  conscience  is  as- 
suaged. Herein  lies  the  weakness  of  all  the  philosophic  schemes, 
that  they  do  not  so  much  as  profess  to  make  any  provision  to 
meet  this  felt  want ;  and  herein  lies  the  weakness  of  all  forms  of 
superstition,  that  they  would  accomplish  the  end  by  means  which 


488  WHAT    IS    NEEDFUL    IN    ORDER    TO 

cannot  be  entertained  till  the  end  itself  is  attained.  The  former 
do  not  so  much  as  profess  to  give  what  to  the  sinner  is  a  pre- 
requisite to  the  commencement  of  religion,  and  the  latter  set  us  in 
search  of  it  in  a  road  which  ever  leads  back  to  the  point  at  which 
we  started.  In  Christianity,  and  in  it  alone,  a  provision  is  made 
for  assuaging  the  sense  of  guilt,  that  thus  the  soul  may  be  allured 
upwards  in  holy  affection,  and  onward  in  practical  godliness. 

Not  only  so,  but  in  order  to  gain  the  heart,  there  must  be  a  free, 
a  full,  and  instant  forgiveness.  It  must  be  free,  for  it  cannot  be 
purchased.  It  must  be  full,  for  if  anything  were  left  unforgiven, 
the  conscience  would  still  grumble,  and  the  soul  so  far  would  be 
in  a  state  of  enmity  and  rebellion.  It  must  be  instant,  otherwise 
the  mind  still  without  peace  could  not  begin  to  cherish  confidence 
and  affection.  Nothing  short  of  this  will  allay  its  tossings  and 
agitated  waves,  and  allow  the  image  of  God,  who  is  love,  to  be 
reflected  on  the  bosom. 

Besides  this  instinctive  aversion  which  it  excites  towards  God, 
an  evil  conscience  is  ever,  it  may  be,  unconsciously  a  source  of  ir- 
ritation. We  say,  peace,  peace,  when  there  is  no  peace.  How 
can  there  be  peace  when  the  soul  is  not  at  peace  with  its  Maker, 
on  whom  it  depends?  And  when  the  soul  is  not  at  peace  with 
God,  it  cannot  be  at  peace  with  itself.  When  conscience,  as  the 
regulator,  has  lost  its  control,  all  the  other  principles  of  the  human 
mind  are  in  disorder,  and  are  moving  with  great,  but  also  with 
appalling  rapidity,  and  each  in  succession  disturbing  the  soul,  and 
all  adding  to  the  tumult.  Instead  of  love,  peace,  and  trust,  there 
will  be  instincts,  lusts,  arid  passions,  under  no  restraint  except 
that  which  is  laid  upon  them  by  their  jostling  on  one  another. 
When  the  winds  of  heaven  cease,  the  waves  of  the  ocean  gradu- 
ally rock  themselves  to  rest ;  and  when  the  conscience,  acting  on 
behalf  of  God,  ceases  to  lash  the  soul,  there  is  a  preparation  made 
tor  all  the  thoughts  and  feelings  gradually  composing  themselves 
into  calmness  and  repose. 

(2.)  Let  us  mark  how,  contemporaneously  with  the  pacifying 
of  the  conscience,  there  is  presented  an  object  fitted  to  win  the 
affections  now  at  liberty  to  flow  towards  it.  The  Saviour,  who 
delivers  us  from  the  condemnation  of  sin,  presents  himself  in  all 
his  loveliness  in  order  to  gain  our  hearts. 

"  WHOM  HAVING  NOT  SEEN.  YE  LOVE."  Some,  we  are  aware, 
would  doubt  of  the  possibility  of  our  loving  an  object  which  we 
have  not  seen,  and  would  represent  the  affection  of  the  believer  to 


THE    RESTORATION    OF    MAN. 

\ 

his  unseen  Redeemer  as  visionary  in  the  extreme.  But  in  doing 
so,  they  shut  their  eyes  to  a  property  of  our  nature  which  is  every 
day  in  exercise — truly,  there  are  persons  who  do  the  greatest  dis- 
honor to  human  nature,  while  they  pretend  to  exalt  it.  Man  is 
so  constituted  by  his  Maker  as  to  be  able  and  disposed  to  love 
objects  that  are  distant  and  unseen. 

We  go  farther,  and  maintain  that  it  is  not  sense  which  kindles 
the  mental  affection  of  love.  It  is  conception,  the  conception 
of  a  lovely  object,  which  calls  forth  love  towards  that  object ;  and 
sense  aids  affection  only  so  far  as  it  aids  our  conceptions,  and  in 
making  them  more  vivid  it  makes  them  more  fitted  to  awaken 
the  emotion.  Let  us  inquire  whether  we  have  not  in  the  Scripture 
representation  of  Jesus  everything  needful  to  call  forth  emotion. 
Let  us  inquire,  in  particular,  whether  we  have  not  much  that 
makes  up  for  the  want  of  sensible  manifestation. 

First,  we  have  in  the  Word  a  very  clear  and  lively  picture  of 
the  character  of  the  Redeemer.  When  the  information  commu- 
nicated to  us  in  regard  to  any  given  individual  is  very  vague  and 
imperfect,  it  is  difficult,  however  worthy  he  may  be,  to  fix  our 
affections  upon  him.  Had  we  been  commanded  to  love  Jesus 
without  any  particular  account  being  given  of  his  life  or  his  love, 
and  without  the  lovely  features  of  his  character  being  delineated, 
it  must  have  been  very  difficult  for  us  to  obey.  But  in  Jesus,  as 
presented  to  us  in  the  Gospels,  we  have  everything  to  attract  and 
retain  the  affections.  Oh,  that  we  had  but  lived  in  the  days  when 
Jesus  tabernacled  on  the  earth  !  is  the  wish  which  will  at  times 
rise  up  in  our  breasts.  So  situated,  we  think  that  it  might  have 
been  easier  for  us  to  love  him.  Now,  in  opposition  to  such  vain 
wishes,  and  the  gross  ideas  on  which  they  are  founded,  we  main- 
tain that  we  have  a  view  of  the  character  of  Jesus  as  much  fitted 
to  engage  the  affections  as  even  those  who  were  supposed  to  be  so 
much  more  highly  favored.  For  just  suppose  that  we  had  beeti 
living  in  the  land  of  Judea  at  the  time  when  Jesus  was  working 
his  miracles,  and  preaching  his  sublime  doctrine.  On  hearing  a 
report  of  the  new  Teacher,  we  hasten  with  the  crowding  thousands 
to  listen  to  his  discourse ;  we  hear  one,  it  may  be,  of  the  most, 
beautiful  of  his  parables,  or  see  him  perform  one  of  the  most  signal 
of  his  miracles.  The  whole  transaction  leaves  a  deep  impression 
on  our  minds ;  and  because  we  have  seen,  we  believe.  But  in  the 
mean  time  Jesus  and  the  crowd  sweep  by,  or  he  retires  to  the 
mountains  to  pray,  or  he  visits  some  other  part  of  the  land ;  and 


490  WHAT    IS    NEEDFUL    IN    ORDER    TO 

we  are  constrained  to  return  to  the  cares  and  business  of  life,  and 
have  few  other  opportunities  of  meeting  with  him.  Now,  we 
maintain  that  we,  who  have  the  full  Scriptures  in  our  hands,  have 
a  better  means  of  forming  a  full  and  attractive  conception  of  our 
Lord  than  those  who  have  lived  in  these  so  apparently  favorable 
circumstances.  In  the  writings  of  the  Evangelists  we  have  his 
beautiful  discourses,  his  striking  parables,  and  casual  remarks,  all 
collected  within  a  narrow  compass,  and  a  lively  delineation  of  his 
conduct,  and  all  the  particular  incidents  of  it  by  parties  who  lose 
sight  of  themselves  in  thinking  of  their  Master,  and  who  never 
interpose  to  obstruct  any  of  the  light  which  comes  from  him.  We, 
as  it  were — so  lively  is  the  painting — see  Jesus  acting,  and  hear 
him  speaking,  and  that  in  a  great  variety  of  interesting  and  in- 
structive circumstances.  We  see  him  while  with  his  disciples, 
and  with  the  Jewish  doctors,  amidst  the  acclamation  of  the  people, 
and  amidst  their  execrations,  too,  as  he  rejoiced  over  the  conver- 
sion of  sinners,  and  as  he  grieved  over  their  hardness  of  heart,  as 
he  pitied  his  enemies,  and  as  he  wept  over  the  grave  of  a  friend. 
We  have  all  this  in  books  so  simple  that  a  child  can  understand 
them,  and  so  brief  that  a  little  space  of  time  will  enable  us  to 
peruse  them. 

Secondly,  the  Being  whom  we  are  expected  to  love  is  constantly 
bestowing  favors  upon  us.  We  are  willing  to  grant,  that  in  ordi- 
nary circumstances  distance  has  a  tendency  to  lessen  the  regard 
which  friends  entertain  towards  one  another;  but  let  us  suppose 
that  we  have  around  us  constant  memorials  of  our  friend,  and  this 
influence  of  separation  will  be  counteracted.  When  the  bereaved 
mourner,  when  the  widower,  for  instance,  looks  around  his  dwell- 
ing, and  sees  in  every  part  of  it  the  peculiar  property,  or  perhaps 
the  very  workmanship  of  a  beloved  consort ;  and  when  the  widow 
sees  in  every  child  that  clusters  around  her  knee  the  image  of  a 
lost  husband,  they  feel  as  if  the  departed  were  still  present,  and 
that  amidst  these  memorials  they  could  never  forget  those  of 
whom  they  are  so  reminded,  Now,  the  believer  feels  himself  to 
be  so  surrounded  by  memorials  of  God  in  his  works,  in  the  heavens 
and  earth,  and  in  his  wonderful  providence.  The  fact  that  God 
has  made  it  adds  a  new  lustre  to  every  star,  and  a  new  beauty  to 
every  flower,  and  the  meanest  of  the  works  of  God  carry  up  the 
mind  to  the  great  Creator.  Distance,  we  acknowledge,  has  a  ten- 
dency to  lessen  the  affections  of  friends :  but  this  influence  may 
be  overborne  when  the  friend  is  ever  bestowing  substantial  favors. 


THE    RESTORATION    OP    MAN.  491 

The  believer  does  not  feel  that  God  is  absent  when  he  is  con- 
stantly sustained  by  his  power,  and  fed  by  his  bounty.  The 
believer  in  Christ  connects  his  very  temporal  mercies  with  the 
work  and  sufferings  of  his  Saviour.  "  Blessed  be  the  Lord,  who 
daily  loadeth  us  with  benefits,  even  the  God  of  oar  salvation" 

Thirdly,  there  is  provided  a  means  of  communication  between 
the  believer  and  the  object  of  his  affection.  Granting  that  distance 
may  tend  to  lessen  the  affection  of  friends,  we  find  this  influence 
lessened  when  they  can  correspond  by  letter,  or  have  frequent 
opportunities  of  meeting.  We  are  willing  to  acknowledge  that 
the  love  of  the  believer  would  grow  cold  and  languid  were  he 
shut  out  from  all  communication  with  his  God.  But,  in  gracious 
condescension,  God  engages  to  meet  with  those  that  love  him — 
not,  indeed,  in  bodily  presence,  but  not  on  that  account  the  less 
truly  and  effectually  and  comfortably  ;  and  love  him  as  they  may, 
they  are  assured  that  he  is  loving  them  with  a  ten  thousand- fold 
greater  affection.  It  is  one  of  the  most  beneficent  of  the  effects 
of  the  Gospel,  that  it  provides  for  the  renewal  of  that  fellowship 
with  God  which  man  had  lost,  but  after  which  he  is  still  aspiring 
in  the  deeper  moods  of  his  mind.  In  this  communion  there  are 
all  the  elements  to  be  found  in  the  fellowship  of  a  man  with  his 
neighbor.  In  human  fellowships  there  are  four  elements — we 
speak  to  our  neighbor,  and  he  hears  us ;  he  speaks  to  us,  and  we 
hear  him  ;  and  thus  there  is  a  thorough  interchange  of  thought 
and  feeling.  There  are  the  same  elements  in  our  fellowship  with 
God  when  by  faith  we  rise  to  it ;  we  pour  out  our  hearts  before 
him,  and  he  listens  to  us  ;  he  condescends  to  instruct  us,  and  we 
attend  to  the  lessons  which  he  is  giving  us.  With  such  means 
of  communication  available,  the  believer  feels  as  if  his  Saviour 
was  present  with  him  always-;  and  so  far  as  he  still  feels  that  the 
communion  is  distant,  so  far  as  he  still  mourns  an  absent  Lord,  it 
is  to  desire  more  earnestly  to  reach  that  place  where  he  shall  enjoy 
still  closer  and  unbroken  communion. 

Aided  by  such  circumstances  as  these,  it  is  possible  to  form  a 
vivid  and  abiding  conception  of  the  character  of  the  Being  whom 
we  are  required  to  love.  And  that  character  has  in  itself  every- 
thing that  is  grand  and  yet  attractive.  Just  as  there  is  a  beauty 
of  shape  and  color  that  pleases  the  eye,  and  a  sweetness  of  sound 
that  delights  the  ear,  so  there  is  a  moral  loveliness  which  ought 
to  draw  towards  it  the  affections  of  the  soul.  But  here,  in  the 
character  of  Christ  as  God,  we  have  all  kinds  of  beauty  meeting 


492 


WHAT    IS    NEEDFUL    IN    ORDER    TO 


and  harmoniously  blending.  The  excellencies  to  be  found  sepa- 
rately, and  to  a  limited  extent,  in  the  creature  all  meet,  and  are 
infinite  in  him.  We  profess  to  admire  true  majesty  when  we 
meet  with  it;  and  will  we  not  admire  the  Ancient  of  Days,  on  the 
throne  of  the  universe,  amid  the  hosts  of  heaven,  and  exercising 
dominion  over  unnumbered  worlds*?  With  what  should  we  be 
so  much  struck  as  with  spotless  holiness,  which  shrinks  from  the 
very  appearance  of  evil  ?  Alas  !  our  eyes,  as  they  wander  over 
the  world,  cannot  discover  it  among  men,  but  here  we  have  it 
shining  in  beauty,  without  a  spot  to  detract  from  its  loveliness. 
Do  we  feel  ourselves  constrained  to  admire  benevolence?  Do  our 
feelings  flow  towards  the  man  who  feeds  the  hungry,  who  clothes 
the  naked,  and  comforts  the  distressed  ?  And  will  they  not  also 
flow  towards  Him  who  hath  filled  every  part  of  creation,  the  air, 
earth  and  ocean,  woods  and  waters,  with  animated  beings  sus- 
tained by  his  power  and  fed  by  his  bounty  ?  Are  our  hearts  soft- 
ened by  that  tenderness  which  can  forgive  an  enemy  and  receive 
him  as  a  friend?  and  will  they  not  melt  in  love  when  we  hear  of 
God  pardoning  the  very  chief  of  sinners,  stretching  out  his  arms 
to  embrace  them,  and  preparing  for  them  enjoyments  as  glorious 
as  they  are  enduring,  and  they  last  forever  ? 

And  there  are  qualities  in  the  person  and  character  of  the  object 
set  forth  to  our  contemplation  and  love  which  endear  him  yet  more 
to  the  heart.  There  is  something  in  the  very  idea  of  an  infinite 
God  calculated  to  overpower  the  spirit  of  weak  and  sinful  man. 
Man,  in  every  age  of  the  world's  history,  has  been  afraid  to  look 
upon  the  full  purity  of  God.  His  mind,  pained  by  the  contempla- 
tion, has  been  at  great  pains  to  carnalize  a  spiritual  God,  and  em- 
body him  in  symbol.  Man  has  ever  been  carnalizing  God,  and  in 
carnalizing  has  degraded  him  ;  but  here,  in  the  Christian  system, 
is  a  God  incarnate  without  being  degraded.  In  the  Mediator  the 
Divine  and  human  natures  are  united,  and  in  such  a  manner  that 
the  one  does  not  destroy  or  overpower  the  other,  but  each  retains 
its  own  properties,  and  the  whole  is  in  unity  and  harmony.  The 
brightness  of  the  Father's  glory,  without  being  shorn  of  a  single 
ray,  is  represented  under  a  milder  lustre.  Heaven  is  brought 
down  to  earth,  but  still  retaining  its  character  as  heaven,  arid  all 
that  by  the  connection,  the  earth  losing  its  character  as  earth  may 
be  exalted  to  heaven.  All  coldness  and  distrust  are  banished 
when  we  remember,  that  in  drawing  near  to  Christ  it  is  man 


THE    RESTORATION    OF    MAN.  493 

coming  to  man.  Unbelief  is  dispelled  when  we  consider  that  we 
have  a  brother's  heart  beating  for  us  upon  the  throne  of  glory. 

As  in  water  face  answereth  (o  face,  so  the  heart  of  man  to 
man.  There  is  a  universal  sympathy  between  the  members  of 
the  human  family — there  is  a  universal  language  which  finds  a 
response  in  every  man's  bosom.  The  cry  of  distress  on  the  part 
of  one  man  awakens  compassion  in  the  breast  of  every  other  man. 
Let  a  person  indicate  that  he  is  in  trouble.,  and  numbers  will  crowd 
around  him  with  eager  curiosity  and  intense  emotion.  The  lan- 
guage of  feeling  and  sentiment  will  ever  stir  up  corresponding  feel- 
ing and  sentiment.  The  orator  and  poet  exercise  such  power  over 
mankind,  because  they  address  these  essential  feelings  of  hu- 
manity. While  our  hearts  are  naturally  drawn,  by  certain  senti- 
ments and  sympathies,  to  every  other  man,  there  are  certain  men, 
or  classes  of  men,  towards  whom  our  hearts  are  attracted  with 
greater  force,  as,  for  instance,  towards  all  whose  sensibilities  are 
quick,  and  whose  heart  is  tender.  And  if  these  persons  have  them- 
selves been  in  trouble,  if  their  heart  has  been  melted  and  softened 
by  the  dispensations  of  God  pressing  heavily  upon  them,  our  hearts 
turn  towards  them  in  yet  stronger  confidence.  Disposed  at  all 
times  to  love  such,  our  hearts  are  especially  moved  towards 
them  when  we  ourselves  are  in  trouble.  Whoever  may  feel  for  us 
we  are  sure  they  will  feel  for  us,  and  we  pour  our  complaints  into 
their  ears  in  the  assurance  of  receiving  attention  and  sympathy. 

Now,  this  principle  has  a  powerful  influence  in  drawing  the 
hearts  of  Christians  so  closely  to  their  Saviour.  The  tenderness 
and  sensibility  of  his  human  nature,  as  well  as  the  holy  love  of 
his  Divine  nature,  are  brought  before  us  in  almost  every  incident 
of  his  life.  We  recollect  how  he  fed  the  hungry  and  healed  all 
manner  of  diseases  ;  how  he  restored  the  young  man  whose  dead 
body  was  being  carried  out  of  the  gates  of  the  city  of  Nain  to  the 
embraces  of  his  mother ;  how  he  wept  over  the  grave  of  Lazarus 
and  the  impending  destruction  of  Jerusalem,  and  we  run  to  him 
as  to  one  who  feels  for  us  under  all  our  trials.  We  remember  how 
he  himself  was  acquainted  with  grief,  in  its  multiplied  and  diver- 
sified forms,  in  body  and  in  spirit,  inflicted  by  man  and  God ;  how 
he  was  often  an  hungered,  without  a  home,  or  where  to  lay  his 
head  ;  how  the  tongue  of  calumny  was  raised  against  him,  and 
the  finger  of  scorn  pointed  at  him  :  how  the  favors  which  he  con- 
ferred were  met  by  no  corresponding  gratitude  ;  how  an  apostle 
betrayed  him,  and  the  rulers  of  the  nation  condemned  him,  and 


494  WHAT    IS    NEEDFUL    IN   ORDER   TO 

Ihe  people  demanded  his  crucifixion,  and  reviled  him  in  the  miclsl 
of  his  dying  agonies  ;  how  the  Father  himself  forsook  him  ; — and 
"when  we  remember  this,  we  feel  that  there  is  no  sorrow  of  ours 
which  he  will  not  commiserate.  The  friendless  rejoice,  for  they 
have  a  friend  in  him;  the  helpless  take  courage,  for  their  help  is 
in  him  ;  the  forsaken  lift  up  their  head  and  are  comforted,  in  com* 
inunion  with  him  who  was  himself  forsaken. 

Such  is  the  provision  made  negatively  in  removing  obstacles  to 
the  flow  of  the  afTections,  and  positively  in  furnishing  a  suitable 
object  on  which  to  fix  them.  Could  any  other  than  the  God  who 
made  man  have  so  suited  the  remedy  to  his  nature  and  constitution? 

IV.  THE  CHANGE  IS  ACCOMPLISHED  IN  THE  HEART  OF  MAN 
IN  COMPLETE  ACCORDANCE  WITH  THE  FREEDOM  OF  THE  WlLL. 

Several  interesting  adaptations  present  themselves  under  this 
head. 

(1.)  There  is  a  means  we  have  seen  of  convincing  the  reason, 
and  there  is  also  a  means  of  gaining  the  heart.  These  means 
are  not  sufficient  of  themselves,  such  is  the  perversity  of  the  hu- 
man mind,  radically  to  change  the  character;  but  in  the  very  fact 
that  they  are  employed,  there  is  a  homage  paid  to  the  human  will. 
It  is  of  the  nature  of  the  will  to  be  swayed  by  motives,  in  the  for- 
mation of  which  both  the  understanding  and  the  emotions  act  a 
part,  and  in  the  Christian  religion  all  these  human  principles  have 
their  full  play  and  liberty. 

(2.)  The  blessed  and  Divine  agent  who  produces  the  change 
commonly  works  through  ordinances  of  God's  appointment.  The 
main  means  is  the  truth  set  forth  in  an  inspired  word,  and  thai 
truth  of  a  kind  eminently  fitted  to  awe,  and  yet  to  elevate  ;  to  con- 
vince and  persuade  the  soul.  In  the  use  of  these  means  the  mind 
is  kept  from  indolence  and  inactivity,  and  yet  is  obliged  to  be 
humble  and  dependent.  The  Christian  is  spiritually  put  under 
an  economy  not  differing  in  the  results,  though  differing  in  the 
means,  from  that  under  which  every  man  is  placed  in  the  natural 
providence  of  God.  In  the  use  of  the  ordinary  means  which  com- 
monly lead  to  success  in  worldly  matters  no  man  is  absolutely  sure 
of  securing  his  end  owing  to  the  cross  arrangements  of  Divine 
Providence,  (which  we  were  at  pains  to  analyze  in  the  former 
part  of  the  Treatise,)  while  yet  there  is  such  a  prospect  of  success 
as  to  hold  out  a  motive  to  activity.  It  is  by  this  double  means,  as 
we  have  seen,  that  the  race  is  rendered  at  once  active  and  depen- 
dent. It  is  most  interesting  to  observe  that  we  find  the  same 


THE    RESTORATION    OF   MAN.  495 

double  agency  in  the  spiritual  economy  of  God,  and  in  this  respect 
there  is  a  beautiful  analogy  between  the  natural  and  spiritual 
economies.  In  the  latter  the  means  employed  are  not  of  them- 
selves fitted  to  produce  the  end,  and  hence  the  Christian  is  ren- 
dered dependent  on  a  higher  power,  while,  at  the  same  time,  they 
usually  produce  the  end,  being  so  blessed  of  God,  and  so  he  hag 
sufficient  motive  to  vigilance  and  exertion.  In  the  natural  provi- 
dence of  God,  on  the  other  hand,  the  means  produce  the  end  of 
themselves,  but  may  be  thwarted  by  a  thousand  cross  providences. 
May  we  not  discover  a  design  in  the  very  diversity  of  the  means 
employed?  In  the  natural  providence  of  God  the  means  produce 
their  end  by  an  inherent  agency,  and  so  invariably  produce  the 
end,  except  in  so  far  as  they  may  be  crossed  by  other  agencies. 
All  this  is  done  in  order  that  we  may  put  trust  in  nature,  in  order 
that  sight  itself  may  induce  us  to  put  faith  in  it,  and  that  we 
may  see  the  interposition  of  God  more  impressively  when  the  end 
is  not  produced.  In  the  spiritual  providence  of  God,  on  the  other 
hand,  the  mean  has  no  inherent  power  to  produce  the  end,  and 
thus  the  Christian  is  prevented  from  trusting  in  it,  and  made  to 
look  more  devotedly  to  God  as  the  true  and  alone  source  of  all 
spiritual  excellence.  It  is  of  the  manner  of  God  in  all  his  works 
to  produce  the  same  end  by  more  than  one  means,  and  we  may 
discover  the  Divine  wisdom  in  the  very  variation  of  the  agency  to 
suit  the  circumstances. 

(3.)  We  do  not  perceive  the  agent  who  changes  the  character 
at  work,  but  we  conclude  that  he  has  been  working  by  discovering 
the  effects  produced.  It  is  for  this  reason,  among  others,  that  he  is 
compared  to  the  wind.  "Thou  hearest  the  sound  thereof,  but 
canst  not  tell  whence  it  cometh,  nor  whither  it  goeth  ;  so  is  every 
one  that  is  born  of  the  spirit."  The  silent  nature  of  the  Spirit's 
operations  has  sometimes  made  his  agency  to  be  denied  altogether 
by  those  who  are  ever  demanding  some  sensible  evidence  of  the 
truth  communicated  in  the  word.  But  those  who  urge  this  ob- 
iection  forget  that  many  of  the  most  powerful  of  the  agents  of 
nature  are  themselves  unseen,  and  are  only  to  be  discovered  by 
their  fruits.  We  do  not,  for  instance,  see  the  wind,  either  when 
it  comes  in  the  gentle  breeze  to  fan  us,  or  when,  in  the  hurricane, 
it  works  such  devastation  in  the  labors  of  man  and  the  very  works 
of  God.  The  heat  that  nourishes  the  plants  of  the  earth,  and  the 
electricity  that  is  so  intimately  connected  with  all  atmospherical 
and  organic  changes,  move  secretly  and  in  silence.  These  indi- 


496  WHAT    IS    NEEDFUL    IN    ORDER    TO 

viduals  forget  that  God  is  always  himself  unseen  in  the  midst  of 
his  works.  When  we  walk  forth  in  the  silence  of  eventide  to  medi- 
tate, we  are  constrained  to  acknowledge  that  God  is  everywhere 
present  among  these  works  of  grandeur ;  and  yet,  by  intense  gaze, 
we  cannot  discover  his  person,  nor  by  listening,  hear  the  sound  of 
his  footsteps.  No  jarring  sound  of  mechanism  comes  across  the 
void  that  intervenes  between  us  and  these  heavens — no  voice  of 
boasting  reaches  our  ears  to  tell  of  the  worker;  it  is  the  heavens 
themselves  that  declare  his  glory.  And  why  should  the  God  who 
created  us  not  be  able  to  renew  the  heart  when  it  is  debased  b\ 
the  effects  of  sin,  and  yet  be  as  unseen  in  the  one  case  as  the  other? 
And  there  is  a  manifest  congruity  in  the  very  circumstance,  that 
this  agent  conducts  his  work  so  silently  and  imperceptibly.  It  is 
only  by  such  a  mode  of  procedure  that  the  spirit  of  man  can  retain 
its  separate  action  and  freedom.  There  is  no  violence  done  to 
man's  nature  in  the  supernatural  work  carried  on  in  the  heart. 
The  dealings  of  God  are  in  every  respect  suited  to  the  essential 
and  indestructible  principles  of  man's  nature.  "  I  drew  them  with 
the  cords  of  a  man,  with  the  bands  of  love." 

V.  Given  a  fallen  race  ;  to  set  them  on  a  CAREER  OF  ACTIVE 
OBEDIENCE, — is  a  problem  which  all  reformers  and  philanthropists 
of  the  highest  order  have  been  endeavoring  to  solve,  and  with  but 
very  meagre  success.  Revelation  professes  to  have  solved  this 
problem,  and  it  propounds  the  following  constructions : — 

(1.)  It  provides  a  pacified  conscience  and  a  pacified  God,  and 
both  pacified  in  agreement  with  the  law  of  their  nature.  Other 
and  mere  human  systems  make,  and  can  make,  no  such  provision, 
and  hence  their  partial  failure.  Under  a  reproaching  conscience, 
the  mind  feels  an  awkwardness  in  all  the  services  which  it  would 
pay  to  God.  When  the  servant  is  conscious  of  having  given 
offence  to  his  master,  there  will  always  be  somewhat  of  constraint 
in  the  obedience  which  he  renders,  till  such  time  as  he  has  made 
confession  of  guilt  and  obtained  forgiveness;  and  there  is  a  re- 
straint proceeding  from  a  like  cause,  in  the  service  which  the  sin- 
ner, laboring  under  an  unpacified  conscience,  would  render  to  God. 
Besides,  when  he  has  no  reason  to  think  that  his  past  offences 
have  been  forgiven,  he  feels  as  if  all  the  exertions  which  he  could 
make  in  time  to  come  must  be  utterly  fruitless.  After  he  has 
done  his  utmost,  he  feels  that  he  has  not  fulfilled  that  law  of  God 
which  is  so  straight,  and  so  unbending  just  because  it  is  so  straight 
Climb  as  he  may  the  height  of  perfection,  he  sees  the  summit 


THE    RESTORATION    OF    MAN.  497 

rising  still  above  him,  wrapped  in  darkness  and  lurid  with  flame. 
After  he  has  made  some  great  exertion,  he  looks  to  the  law  as  if 
it  might  give  him  a:  smile  of  approbation,  and  he  sees  only  a  thick- 
ening frown,  as  it  were,  settling  upon  its  face.  Lashed  by  con- 
science, he  makes  greater  and  yet  greater  struggles,  only  to  feel  all 
his  toilsome  labors  to  be  like  those  of  a  man  laboring  under  a  load, 
which  is  crushing  him  to  the  ground,  or  like  the  convulsive  strug- 
gles of  a  drowning  man  sinking  deeper  and  deeper  in  the  water. 

Suppose  that  there  is  an  individual  who  has  contracted  a  load 
of  debt,  which  it  is  impossible  for  him  to  pay ;  and  who,  toil  as  he 
may,  finds  all  his  exertions  to  be  lost,  because  they  do  not  sensibly 
lessen  his  obligations.  Care  is  painted  on  his  countenance ;  fear 
haunts  him  by  day,  and  disturbs  his  rest  at  night.  The  load 
which  is  pressing  on  his  mind,  comes  at  length  to  prostrate  his 
energies  ;  he  flees  the  society  of  his  friends  ;  he  buries  himself  in 
solitude,  and  is  ready  to  give  himself  up  to  despondency  and 
despair.  He  has  lost  all  his  accustomed  energy  and  ingenuity, 
because  he  has  lost  all  hope  of  success,  and  all  motive  to  activity. 
How.  we  ask,  is  it  possible  to  rouse  this  man  anew  to  a  healthy 
energy  ?  We  know  of  only  one  way  in  which  it  can  be  effectually 
done.  In  his  hour  of  deep  mental  prostration  some  friend  runs  to 
his  aid,  and  supplies  him  with  all  that  is  needful,  in  order  to  can- 
cel his  debt.  The  man  now  feels  a  burden  lifted  from  his  breast, 
while  gratitude  for  the  seasonable  aid  is  quickening  him  to  exer- 
tion, and  hope  is  anew  irradiating  his  path.  Behold  him  once 
more  in  his  customary  place,  holding  up  his  head  in  independence 
in  the  midst  of  his  associates,  engaged  with  his  wonted  energy  in 
the  discharge  of  duty,  and  regarding  all  his  past  difficulties  as 
only  an  incentive  to  additional  vigilance.  The  reader  will  at  once 
see  the  application  of  this  illustration,  as  fitted  to  lead  him  to  ac- 
knowledge the  propriety  of  that  scheme  in  which  the  burden  of 
condemnation  is  removed,  to  set  forth  man  upon  a  career  of  re- 
newed obedience. 

(2.)  Revelation  provides  a  supernatural  agency  to  lead  the  soul 
to  love  and  obedience ;  this  agency,  reaching  the  innermost  prin- 
ciples of  the  mind,  and  that  not  to  do  them  violence,  but  restore 
them  to  order. 

(3.)  Revelation  provides  also  a  means  of  gaming  the  affections 
by  means  of  the  objects  presented  to  it.  The  service  now  paid  is 
different  altogether  from  the  previous  service.  The  one  service, 
the  legal  service,  was  irksome  ;  the  other,  is  willing  and  cheerful. 

32 


498         WHAT  IS  NEEDFUL  FOR  THE  RESTORATION  OF  MAN. 

While  the  one  is  the  task  of  a  prisoner,  who  cannot,  labor  as  he 
may,  earn  his  freedom,  the  other  is  the  homage  of  a  spirit  restored 
to  liberty.  The  one  proceeds  from  the  fear  which  prostrates,  and 
so  is  restrained,  limited,  selfish;  the  other,  proceeds  from  an 
inspiring  confidence  and  a  ready  mind,  and  is  in  consequence 
hearty,  generous,  and  devoted.  In. the  one  service,  the  man  works 
in  the  spirit  of  the  hireling,  always  pausing  to  ask  if  he  has  not 
done  enough,  and  if  his  taskmaster  is  not  satisfied ;  in  the  other, 
in  the  spirit  of  a  son  who  loves  the  service,  and  him  who  appointed 
it,  and  is  ever  asking  if  his  father  in  heaven  has  any  other  service 
which  he  wishes  him  to  perform. 

The  famous  external  tests  of  Leslie,  in  his  Short  and  Easy  Meth- 
od with  the  Deists,  are  not  we  believe  more  convincing  than  those 
now  referred  to.  We  affirm,  without  any  risk  of  contradiction, 
that  no  religion,  originating  in  human  wisdom  or  human  history, 
has  met,  or  even  so  much  as  attempted  to  meet,  these  fundamen- 
tal principles  of  the  human  mind  which  are  all  satisfied  in  Chris- 
tianity. It  is  surely  strange,  that  a  system  in  such  beautiful 
harmony  with  all  the  constituent  parts  of  man's  nature,  should 
have  sprung  up  among  the  hills  and  plains  of  Judah.  We  could 
believe  that  a  Hebrew  shepherd  composed  the  Principia  of  Newton, 
or  propounded  the  principles  of  the  Novum  Organum,  or  the  pro- 
foundest  modern  work  on  metaphysical  philosophy,  more  readily 
than  that  he  could  thus  have  measured  the  heights  of  the  Divine 
character,  or  sounded  the  depths  of  human  nature.  We  are 
utterly  confounded  and  lost  in  amazement,  till  above  the  plains 
where  ancient  shepherds  tended  their  flocks,  we  see  a  light  from 
heaven  shining  around  them,  and  hear  a  voice  guiding  them  to 
the  Saviour,  which  is  Christ  the  Lord. 

But  we  have  now  reached  the  loci  communes,  the  common 
places  of  divinity  which  pious  divines  have  trodden,  while  the 
steps  of  peasants  have  followed  them.  These  are  now  the  topics  en- 
larged on  from  the  pulpit,  and  which,  followed  out  during  the  week 
by  the  ploughman  in  the  fields,  by  the  shepherd  on  his  mountains, 
and  the  mechanic  in  his  shop,  have  furnished  them  with  the  most 
convincing  of  all  evidences,  and  leading  to  faith,  have  elevated 
them  above  their  station  in  society,  for  they  have  elevated  them 
above  the  earth  altogether. 


THE    GERMAN    INTUITIONAL    THEOLOGY.  499 

ILLUSTRATIVE  NOTE  (G).— THE  GERMAN  INTUITIONAL  THEOLOGY. 

We  think  it  needful  to  distinguish  between  the  method  which 
lias  been  pursued  in  this  work  and  that  speculative  spirit  which 
some  are  seeking  lo  introduce  into  our  country  through  the  Ger- 
man philosophy  and  theology.  Throughout  the  whole  of  this 
Treatise  we  have  been  examining  this  world  in  an  inductive  man- 
ner.  with  the  view  of  obtaining  a  solution  of  some  of  the  most  im- 
portant questions  on  which  the  mind  of  man  can  meditate.  These 
truths,  if  we  do  not  mistake,  conduct  to  a  well-grounded  belief  iu 
the  Divinity  of  the  Scriptures,  But  when  reason  has  handed  us 
over  to  revelation,  it  bids  us  listen  to  that  revelation.  This  wit- 
ness as  much  as  says,  "there  standeth  one  among  you  greater 
than  I,  and  I  exhort  you  to  look  to  tlim." 

The  inconsistency  oC  those  who  profess  to  believe  in  the  Divinity 
of  the  Word,  and  who  yet  sit  in  judgment  upon  its  separate  truths, 
is  all  too  evident  to  require  to  be  pointed  out  in  a  formal  manner. 
The  fallibility  of  the  Pope,  established  in  so  many  instances)  is  a 
proof  that  his  whole  pretensions  to  infallibility  are  unfounded. 
We  hold  on  the  same  principle,  that  if  there  be  real  inconsistencies 
and  positive  errors  in  the  Bible — which  has  never  been  demon- 
strated,  and  we  believe  never  can  be  demonstrated — it  is  a  proof 
that  it  has  not  the  sanction  of  heaven.  On  the  other  hand,  if  the 
Scriptures  be  truly  the  word  of  God.,  reason  itself  teaches  us  to 
listen  to  them  as  to  reason  which  cannot  err.  That  there  should 
be  difficulties,  mysteries,  and  even  apparent  discrepancies  in  the 
word  of.  God,  is  only  what  reason  would  lead  us  to  expect,  for 
reason  meets  with  them  in  all  its  inquiries  into  the  works  and 
ways  of  God.  In  despite  of  this  principle,  which  has  so  long  held 
a  strong  hold  upon  the  thinking  mind  of  our  country,  we  are  in 
danger  of  being  inundated  from  another  country,  and  that  on  the 
part  of  men  who  profess  to  believe,  in  a  vague  sense,  in  the  Di- 
vinity of  the  Scriptures,  with  principles  which  would  set  every  man's 
own  spirit — we  say  it  deliberately — to  teach  the  Spirit  of  God. 

There  is  an  end,  indeed,  for  the  present — and  we  should  hope 
forever — to  that  boasted  rationalist  school  winch  prevailed  to  some 
extent  in  our  land  in  a  former  age.  Its  beautiful  icicles,  thought 
to  be  so  very  beautiful,  and  really  so  very  cold,  have  melted  away 
in  the  heat  of  a  more  fervent  season*  But  the  dreamy  sultriness 
which  has  succeeded  is  in  many  cases  as  unwholesome,  and  as 
unfavorable  to  spiritual  life,  as  the  cold  which  it  has  banished. 


500  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

All  deep  and  earnest  thinkers  now  see  that  there  are  truths  in 
every  branch  of  science  too  high,  too  deep,  and  too  broad  to  be 
defined  by  a  formal  logic,  or  grasped  by  the  logical  understanding, 
that  is,  by  the  understanding  logically  employed.  Human  logic 
cannot  define  electricity  or  heat,  nor  explain  vegetable  or  animal 
life;  and  how  can  we  expect  it  to  unfold  the  mysteries  of  the 
Godhead,  and  the  Divine  decrees?  The  human  understanding, 
so  far  from  being  able  to  prove  everything,  needs  itself  a  basis  on 
which  to  rest,  and  that  basis  unproved  and  incapable  of  proof. 

But  this  age  is  as  unwilling  to  do  homage  to  the  Word  as  that 
which  has  passed  away.  Instead  of  the  RATIONALIST,  we  have 
now  what  we  call  the  INTUITIONAL  THEOLOGY.  It  is  not  now 
the  understanding,  but  intuitions  of  thought  and  feeling  which 
are  placed  above  the  Word,  and  to  them,  with  the  Word  as  a 
mere  servant  or  assistant,  is  allotted  the  ,task  of  constructing  a 
religion.  The  religion  thus  devised,  if  not  so  consistent  as  that 
formed  by  the  understanding,  is  vastly  more  showy  and  gorgeous, 
and  suits  itself  to  a  great  many  more  of  the  impulses  of  human 
nature.  Just  as  in  natural  religion  the  blank  scepticism  of  former 
times  has  been  obliged,  in  the  present  day,  to  clothe  itself  in  the 
dress  of  pantheism  to  keep  mankind  from  utterly  abhorring  itj 
so  in  revealed  religion  the  rationalism  which  was  felt  to  be  insuf- 
ficient for  any  one  practical  purpose  whatsoever,  either  in  the  re- 
straining of  sin  or  the  gendering  of  holiness,  has  become  a  more 
pretending  intuitionalism.  Persons  who  believe  in  the  Scriptures 
in  no  higher  sense  than  they  believe  in  Homer,  Pythagoras,  or 
Plato,  who  could  not  give  an  intelligible  answer  to  the  question, 
what  think  ye  of  Christ?  whose  son  is  he  ?  and  who  know  not  so 
much  as  what  the  Holy  Ghost  meaneth,  do  yet  decorate  their 
pages  with  constant  references  to  faith,  to  spiritual  life,  and  the 
religious  consciousness. 

It  would  carry  us  too  far  away  from  our  present  purpose  to 
trace  the  history  of  this  system  ;  nor  do  we  think  it  needful  care- 
fully to  allot  to  each  supporter  his  share  of  the  heterogeneous 
materials  which  have  been  collected  to  build  the  fabric.  Certain 
principles  laid  down  by  Kant,  principles  which  we  regard  as  false 
in  themselves,  were  being  followed  out  in  Germany  to  their  legiti- 
mate consequences,  and  producing  a  very  pretending  form  of  uni- 
versal scepticism,  when  Jacobi  rushed  in  to  protect  philosophy  by 
setting  up  Feeling  (Gefuehl)  as  a  counterpart  principle  to  the 
Understanding.  Schleiermacher  carried  a  similar  principle  into 


THE    GERMAN    INTUITIONAL    THEOLOGY.  501 

religion,  and  sought  to  construct  a  religion  out  of  feeling  or  intui- 
tion. This  scheme  has  been  adopted  by  De  Wette,  and  even,  we 
regret  to  say,  to  some  extent  by  Neander  and  other  eminent  di- 
vines, who  have  of  late  years  been  defending  their  system  against 
another  supported  by  the  followers  of  Hegel,  which  professes  to  be 
more  rational  and  logical,  and  they  defend  their  system  as  ear- 
nestly as  if  they  were  defending. Christianity.  As  the  practical 
result  of  the  whole,  the  scepticism  which  began  with  the  clergy 
has  now  gone  down  to  the  common  people,  and  has  assumed  a 
form  sufficiently  vulgar  and  offensive ;  and  the  followers  of 
Schleiermacher  find  that  they  have  no  power  to  allay  the  spirit 
which  they  have  called  up,  for  the  dreamy  intuitions  of  the  divines 
are  felt  to  be  as  incapable  of  being  grasped  by  the  practical  un- 
derstanding of  the  common  people,  as  they  are  acknowledged  to 
be  incapable  of  being  apprehended  by  the  logical  understanding 
of  the  philosophers.  Yet  this  is  the  system  which  is  being  im- 
ported into  our  country  by  certain  clergymen  of  the  Anglican 
Establishment  and  Independent  ministers  in  England,  In  par- 
ticular, Mr.  Morell,  after  mixing  with  it  a  farther  medley  from  the 
eclectic  philosophy  of  Cousin,  is  seeking  to  recommend  it  to  the 
British  public.  Our  limits  do  not  admit  of  our  exposing  its  errors, 
but  we  are  tempted  to  point  out  the  fallacies  to  be  found  in  some 
of  its  principles, 

1st,  We  are  not  sure  about  setting  the  intuitions,  which  these 
divines  so  magnify,  above  the  reason.  The  real  intuitions  of  the 
human  soul  are  just  the  human  faculties  and  feelings  in  their 
simple  and  original  exercise  acting  according  to  their  fundamental 
principles.  Reason  cannot  prove  the  truth  of  these  fundamental 
principles,  but  reason  attests  their  existence,  and  sanctions  them 
as  fundamental  principles.  Crede  ut  intelligas  was  the  maxim 
of  Anselm,  and  the  counterpart  maxim  of  Abelard,  intellige  ut 
credas.  Now,  both  of  these  maxims  are  true,  and  true  in  an 
important  sense.  There  must,  on  the  one  hand,  be  an  intuitive 
belief  as  the  basis  of  all  reason ;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  the  intu- 
itive belief  is  not  contrary  to  reason,  but  is  sanctioned  by  reason 
as  an  intuitive  belief.  We  cannot  demonstrate  by  reasoning  that 
•"  things  which  are  equal  to  the  same  things,  are  equal  to  one 
another."  On  the  contrary,  we  must  assume  it;  but  we  assume 
it,  not  against  the  reason,  but  by  the  reason.  We  are  not,  then, 
to  put  confidence  in  everything  which  may  profess  to  be  an  intui- 
tive belief,  but  we  are  to  trust  only  in  those  which  reason  declares 


ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

to  be  intuitions.  The  two  maxims  are  both  true,  and  the  one 
limits  the  other.  Remove  the  intuitive  belief,  and  we  have  no 
beginning  to  the  demonstrations  of  reason.  Discard  the  reason, 
and  we  may  be  tempted  to  regard  as  intuition  every  whim  of 
fancy  or  impulse  of  feeling.  The  reason  without  the  intuition 
would  begin  with  scepticism,  and  could  never  conduct  to  truth 
But  it  is  of  no  less  importance  to  remark,  that  the  intuitive  belief 
untested  by  reason  might  begin  with  error,  and  could  not  therefore 
end  with  truth.  In  the  former  case,  the  reason  without  a  basis 
could  not  rear  a  superstructure.  The  whole  processes  would  be 
like  multiplying  nothing  by  nothing,  and  must  ever  give  nothing 
as  the  result.  In  the  latter  case,  the  vague,  erroneous  belief  with 
which  we  started  must  land  us  sooner  or  later  in  error,  and  the 
mind  would  ever  have  to  unweave  its  own  web.  Nay,  the  latter 
may  just  as  readily  conduct  to  scepticism  as  the  former;  for,  just 
as  the  individual  who  has  trusted  every  man  who  professes  to  be- 
his  friend,  conies  at  last  to  be  utterly  sceptical  of  the  existence 
of  friendship,  so  the  person  who  sets  out  believing  every  supposed 
natural  intuition  may  speedily  arrive  at  a  universal  infidelity.* 
For  ourselves,  we  are  exceedingly  suspicious  of  some  of  those  in- 
tuitions on  which  the  theologians  of  Germany  would  rear  such  a 
superstructure,  such  as  faith  in  God,  consciousness  of  God,  the- 
knowledge  of  the  infinite  and  absolute,  the  gazing  upon  truth  as. 
a  whole,  the  perception  of  abstract  beauty  and  holiness,  and  the 
religious  life  or  consciousness.  We  would  like  to  see  them  thor- 
oughly sifted  and  tested  in  the  sense  in  which  we  have  explained 
by  human  intelligence,  while  we  would  like  to  see  such  an  ac- 
knowledged intuition  and  faculty  as  the  conscience  followed  out 
toils  legitimate  consequences  by  the  learning  and  penetration-  of  a 
German  philosopher. 

2dly,  We  maintain  that  revelation  addresses  itself  to  the  other 
qualities  of  the  mind  besides  the  intuitions  or  intuitional  con- 
sciousness. We  have  our  doubts  of  the  propriety  of  arranging  in 
a  general  way  all  the  higher  faculties  of  the  mind  into  the  logical 
understanding  and  the  intuitional  consciousness.  What  is  made 
of  the  conscience  on  such  a  system— what  of  the  will — what  of 
the  emotions?  Religion,  as  a  practical  matter,  is  not  addressed 
exclusively  either  to  the  logical  understanding  or  the  intuitions. 
Just  as  any  one  of  them,  or  the  two  combined,  cannot  make  any 

*  The  illustration  is  taken  from  the  Phaedo,  S.  89,  of  Plato,  where  it  is  applied  to 
reasoning. 


THE    GERMAN    INTUITIONAL    THEOLOGY.  503 

man  a  faithful  father  or  a  good  son,  a  just  sovereign  or  a  righteous 
judge,  so  they  are  incapable  of  turning  the  sinner  into  a  good 
Christian.  The  Christian  religion  addresses  itself  to  the  whole 
soul,  providing  evidence  and  facts  for  the  understanding,  arid 
truth,  which  shines  in  its  own  light,  to  the  reason  ;  holding  forth 
a  perfect  law  and  a  perfect  righteousness  to  the  moral  faculty  ; 
excellence  to  gain  the  will,  and  loveliness  to  draw  the  affections ; 
exhibiting  these,  now  separate  and  scattered  in  individual  persons, 
incidents  and  propositions,  and  again  displaying  them  all  in  unity 
in  the  character  of  God  and  Christ.  As  each  of  these  faculties  is 
addressed,  so  each  has  its  part  to  perform;  the  understanding  ap- 
prehending the  facts,  examining  the  evidence,  and  defending  the 
truth  ;  the  reason  sanctioning  and  adopting  the  truth  when  pre- 
sented ;  the  conscience  bringing  the  sinner  to  the  knowledge  of 
sin,  and  approving  of  the  righteousness  of  Christ;  the  will  ac- 
cepting of  God  as  the  perfect  good  ;  and  the  affections  flowing  forth 
towards  God  and  all  mankind,  and  enlivening  the  soul  as  they 
flow.  We  deny  that  religion  has  its  seat  among  the  mere  intui- 
tions. It  spreads  itself  over  the  soul,  and  every  faculty  and  feel- 
ing has  a  work  to  perform. 

3dly,  It  is  appointed  of  God  that  the  objective  truth  presented 
in  the  word  should  be  the  means  of  rectifying  the  whole  soul. 
There  is  truth  presented  to  all  and  each  of  the  faculties  that  all 
and  each  of  the  faculties  may  be  rectified.  There  are  persons 
who  complain  of  the  word  because  it  is  not  addressed  to  some  one 
department  of  the  human  soul  on  which  they  set  a  high  value. 
The  systematic  divine  wonders  that  it  is  not  a  mere  scheme  of 
dogmatic  theology,  forgetting  that  in  such  a  case  it  would  address 
itself  to  the  mere  understanding.  The  German  speculatists,  on 
the  other  hand,  complain  that  it  is  not  a  mere  exhibition  of  the 
pure  ideas  of  the  true  and  the  good,  forgetting  that  in  such  a  case 
it  would  have  little  or  no  influence  on  the  more  practical  faculties. 
Others  seem  to  regret  that  it  is  not  a ,11101*6  code  of  morality,  while 
a  fourth  class  would  wish  it  to  be  altogether  an  appeal  to  the  feel- 
ings. But  the  word  is  inspired  by  the  same  God  who  formed  man 
at  first,  ar\d  who  knows  what  is  in  man ;  and  He  would  rectify  not 
merely  the  understanding  or  intuitions,  not  merely  the  conscience 
3r  affections,  but  the  whole  man  after  the  image  of  God.  It  is  the 
enlarged  and  comprehensive  character  of  the  word  which  makes 
narrow  minds  complain  of  it.  Its  variety  is  as  great  as  that  of 


504  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

the  faculties  and  feelings,  which  it  would  restore  to  their  primitive 
state  and  proper  exercise. 

kihly,  Along  with  the  objective  word  there  is  a  Divine  power 
applying  it  internally,  not  merely  to  the  intuitions,  but  to  the 
whole  faculties  of  the  soul.  This  Divine  power  does  not  act  in- 
dependently of  the  objective  truth  presented  in  the  word,  but  acts 
by  means  of  the  truth,  and  thus  deals  with  man  as  an  intelligent 
and  free  agent.  It  is  by  the  double  influence  of  the  objective 
truth  and  the  subjective  operation  of  the  Spirit  of  God,  that  the 
religious  life  or  consciousness  is  awakened  within. 

othly,  It  appears  evident  to  us  that  the  truth  presented  in  the 
word  must,  in  order  to  rectify  the  faculties  and  feelings,  be  pure 
truth,  without  any  admixture  of  error.  A  corrupted  truth  pre- 
sented to  a  corrupted  mind  would  be  a  new  element  of  confusion 
and  derangement  thrown  into  the  already  bewildered  mind.  Were 
the  mind  not  perverted  it  would  not  need  such  truth  to  rectify  it, 
but  being  perverted,  it  requires  truth  to  set  it  right ;  but  should 
the  revelation  made  to  it  be  mixed  truth  and  error,  it  could  not, 
just  because  it  was  perverted,  separate  the  one  from  the  other. 
"  The  harmony  of  our  nature,"  says  Mr.  Morell,  "  has  been  dis- 
turbed, and  with  it  the  power  of  intuition  is  at  once  diminished 
and  rendered  uncertain."*  This  same  author,  following  his  Ger- 
man masters,  lets  us  know  that  the  Bible  is  mistaken  as  to  its  his- 
torical and  scientific  facts,  incorrect  in  its  language  as  expressing 
the  truth  meant  to  be  conveyed,  erroneous  in  doctrine,  not  unfre- 
quently  wrong  in  its  morality,  and  illogical  in  its  reasoning. 
Every  one  must  see  that  a  word  so  defective  is  not  fitted  to  restore 
the  disturbed  harmony  of  the  soul,  or  to  give  certainty  to  the  in- 
tuitions, but  that  it  is  rather  fitted  to  increase  the  distraction  and 
the  painful  uncertainty.  The  soul  which  has  lost  its  original  vir- 
tue needs  to  be  brought  into  connection  with  a  pure  magnet  in 
order  that  its  attracting  power  may  be  restored.  Had  the  word 
come  to  the  soul  as  a  mixture  of  truth  and  error,  it  would  only 
have  thickened  the  doubts  of  the  anxious  and  inquiring  spirit.  In 
such  a  case  no  one  could  have  been  sure,  in  any  given  passage, 
whether  it  was  the  God  of  truth  that  was  speaking  or  merely 
Paul  or  John,  or  whether  Paul  or  John  had  or  had  not  committed 
a  mistake.  Nor  could  the  mind  as  yet  perverted  and  disorganized 
be  expected  to  distinguish  between  the  truth  and  the  falsehood,  and 
it  would  be  constantly  fixing  on  the  falsehood  as  truth,  and  on  the 

*  Philosophy  of  Religion,  p.  59. 


THE    GERMAN    INTUITIONAL    THEOLOGY.  505 

truth  as  falsehood.  We  cannot  be  grateful  enough  to  God  who 
hath  not  left  man  to  flounder  in  an  abyss  of  darkness,  where  he 
cannot  get  truth  without  error,  and  yet  has  no  light  to  enable  him 
to  distinguish  the  one  from  the  other. 

bthly,  They  are  putting  that  which  is  fiist  last,  and  that  which 
is  last  first,  who  seek  first  a  religious  life,  and  then  imagine  that 
mankind  come  to  devise  a  religion  for  themselves  by  means  of 
that  religious  life.  For  how  are  we  to  get  the  religious  life  but  by 
means  of  the  truth  ?  The  divines  of  the  school  referred  to  are 
speaking  perpetually  about  the  importance  of  the  religious  life ; 
but  they  do  not  tell  us  distinctly  how  the  sinner  naturally  without 
it  may  be  made  to  attain  it.  Now,  we  set  as  high  a  value  as  they 
do  on  a  religious  life ;  we  acknowledge  that  without  it  there  can 
be  no  acceptable  worship  or  service,  no  true  enjoyment  of  God  or 
of  the  pleasures  of  religion.  It  is  just  because  we  set  so  high  a 
value  upon  the  religious  life  that  we  set  so  high  a  value  on  the 
inspired  word  as  the  means  of  awakening  it.  There  is  first  the 
truth  recommended  by  evidence,  apprehended  in  some  measure  by 
the  mind,  and  pressed  upon  the  acceptance  of  the  soul ;  and  then 
there  is  the  truth  acknowledged  and  received  in  faith  through  the 
subjective  operation  of  the  Spirit  of  God  ; — there  is  all  this  as  pre- 
liminary to  the  religious  consciousness.  The  religious  conscious- 
ness thus  produced  consists  of  a  party-colored  robe  of  righteous- 
ness, clothing  and  adorning  the  whole  soul.  Nor  do  we  regard 
ourselves  as  guilty  of  any  real  or  even  apparent  contradiction 
when  we  add,  that  it  is  by  means  of  the  spiritual  life  awakened 
within  that  the  believer  rises  to  a  full  comprehension  and  enjoy- 
ment of  the  truth  which  first  awakened  that  life. 

But,  Ithly,  we  cannot  admit  that  the  religious  life,  even  when 
produced,  has  any  right  to  sit  in  judgment  upon  the  word.  For 
how  do  we  obtain  the  religious  life  but  by  the  truth  ?  Nor  does 
it  seem  possible  to  attain  a  true  spiritual  life  but  by  a  scheme  of 
pure  truth,  bringing  with  it  certainty  and  assurance  to  the  dis- 
ordered and  bewildered  mind.  That  truth  was  conveyed  in  the 
early  Church  by  the  Old  Testament  Scriptures,  and  by  the  in- 
spired teaching  of  the  apostles,  or  of  persons  instructed  by  them, 
and  in  after  ages  it  is  conveyed  by  means  of  the  completed  Scrip- 
tures. That  word  comes  to  us  as  the  truth  of  God,  and  when  ac- 
cepted it  assures  the  mind,  and  succeeds  in  rectifying  it;  but 
having  accepted  it  as  the  truth  of  God,  we  are  not  at  liberty  to 
treat  it  as  a  mixture  of  truth  and  error.  We  are  now  to  obey  the 


506  ILLUSTRATIVE    NOTE. 

truth,  and  not  to  make  the  truth  obey  us.  As  the  mind  needs  pure 
truth  presented  to  rectify  its  judgments,  so  it  cannot,  when  recti- 
fied, treat  that  truth  as  if  it  were  impure — accepting  what  it 
pleases,  and  rejecting  the  rest  according  to  what  it  believes  to  be 
its  intuitions. 

Nor  is  it  to  be  forgotten  that  the  religious  life,  even  when  form- 
ed in  the  soul,  does  not  arrive  at  perfection  on  this  side  the  grave. 
The  religious  life  needs  anew  to  be  fed  and  strengthened  by  the 
truth  which  at  first  quickened  it.  Not  even  those  who  are  in  pos- 
session of  spiritual  life  are  in  a  state  to  set  that  life  above  the 
truth  which  lias  gendered  it;  for  as  it  was  by  this  truth  that  the 
religious  life  was  first  produced,  so  it  is  by  the  same  truth  that  it  is 
perfected.  Nor  are  they  at  liberty  to  despise  the  letter  in  a  pre- 
tended attention  to  the  spirit.  Every  man  who  acts  in  this  man- 
IKT  will  be  at  times  putting  his  own  spirit  in  the  room  of  the  Spirit 
of  truth,  and  will  be  found  asserting  that  to  be  the  Spirit  of  the 
word  which  is  merely  his  own  spirit. 

This  placing  of  the  intuitions  above  the  word  is  in  some  respects 
more  perilous  than  the  petting  of  the  reason  above  the  word ;  for 
when  natural  reason  thus  presumes  to  act  as  the  arbiter  of  reveal- 
ed truth,  we  can  meet  it  on  its  own  grounds.  Its  dogmas,  if  un- 
sound, are  at  least  clear  and  intelligible,  and  so  can  be  met  and 
refuted.  But  this  intuitional  theology  carries  us  into  a  region 
where  every  man's  own  spirit  creates  for  him  a  scheme  which 
cannot  be  so  much  as  examined,  because  it  cannot  be  developed 
in  a  clear  system,  or  put  in  such  a  shape  as  to  admit  of  its  refu- 
tation. In  these  circumstances  we  do  nut  regret  to  find  that  God 
seems  to  have  sent  among  the  builders  of  this  heaven-defying 
tower  such  a  spirit  of  confusion  and  variance,  that  no  two  of  them 
can  speak  the  same  language. 

We  have  a  deep  admiration  for  the  genius  and  learning  of  the 
German  philosophers  and  divines ;  but  with  all  their  ability  and 
scholarship  they  will  never  arrive  at  a  system  of  speculative  phi- 
losophy, clear  and  consistent,  true  and  useful,  till  they  condescend 
to  study  the  human  mind  in  an  inductive  manner;  nor  will  they 
ever  develop  a  sound  system  of  theology,  till  they  submit  to  sit  at 
the  feet  of  Jesus,  and  receive  with  meekness  the  word  from 
him. 


THE    WORLD    TO    COME.  507 

' 
SECTION  V.— THE  WORLD  TO  COME. 

The  world  to  come,  of  which  we  speak,  may  be  understood,  first, 
as  the  future  earth  ;  and,  secondly,  as  the  state  of  man  after  death. 

FIRST,  THE  FUTURE  EARTH.  The  past  and  the  present  point 
alike  to  the  future.  We  live,  not  only  in  a  world  of  change,  we 
live  in  a  world  of  progress.  There  has  been  a  gradual  and  evi 
dently  an  intended  advancement  in  the  physical  and  intellectual 
amelioration  of  the  race.  While  every  benevolent  mind  must  re- 
joice in  this,  it  is  just  to  regret  the  more  that  these  real  improve- 
ments are  incapable  of  renovating  man's  nature  morally  or 
spiritually.  The  improvements  of  which  we  boast  are  mere 
means  or  instruments,  which  may  be  used  for  good,  but  which 
are  also  employed  for  evil.  The  electric  telegraph  will  employ  its 
lightning  velocity  in  the  sprvice  of  sin,  just  as  readily  as  in  the 
service  of  God.  Painting  and  statuary  have  been  patronized  not 
unfrequently  by  the  most  selfish  and  profligate  of  men— such  as 
the  Medici — and  have  been  corrupting  as  well  as  refining  the  minds 
of  their  votaries.  Music  must  ever  waft  the  spirit  of  man  into  a 
region  of  greater  loveliness  and  grandeur  than  the  actual  world  : 
but  instead  of  lifting  it  to  heaven,  it  has  often  transported  it  into 
a  region  where  sin  is  rendered  the  more  fascinating  by  the  dress 
in  which  it  is  presented.  Architecture  has  built  temples  to  God  ; 
but  it  has  also  built  mansions,  in  which  temptation  has  spread  its 
allurements,  and  its  temples  have  been  as  frequently  dedicated  to 
superstition  as  to  the  true  worship  of  God.  There  is  no  one  power 
or  element  in  the  world  capable  of  regenerating  it.  The  power 
which  regenerates  the  world,  like  that  which  regenerates  indi- 
vidual sinners,  must  proceed  from  a  higher  region. 

Nay,  the  very  Church  of  God,  and  the  word  of  God,  cannot  of 
themselves  regenerate  the  world.  They  are  inadequate  for  so 
great  a  work  ;  because  they  cannot,  by  their  own  power,  change 
human  nature.  With  all  our  privileges,  we  feel  that  there  is  still 
something  awanting.  Our  very  acquisitions  impress  us  the  more 
with  our  still  remaining  deficiencies.  We  are  more  astonished  at 
the  crimes  coming  to  light  in  our  day,  than  we  are  in  reading  of 
the  same  deeds  committed  in  any  previous  age.  The  creature  is 
still  groaning  ;  and  it  will  continue  to  do  so  tillj  according  to  the 
promise  of  the  word,  the  Spirit  is  poured  out  on  all  flesh. 

Not  that  we  are  on  this  account  to  despise  or  hate  our  world. 
We  are  rather  to  love  that  world  which  God  so  loved  as  to  give 


508  THE    WORLD    TO    COME. 

his  Son  to  suffer  and  die  for  it.  Whatever  the  gloomy  and  disap- 
pointed may  say  to  the  contrary,  this  world  of  ours  is  a  glorious 
world  after  all.  It  is  glorious  in  the  displays  which  it  gives  of  the 
Divine  perfection  and  beneficence — glorious  in  its  capacity,  and  the 
instruments  ready  for  use.  Let  but  human  nature,  as  the  root  of 
bitterness,  be  regenerated ;  and  then  all  its  capabilities,  all  its  ac- 
quisitions and  improvements  will  be  devoted  to  the  most  beneficent 
purposes,  and  will  change  the  very  aspect  of  the  world.  The 
state  of  the  earth  depends  essentially  on  the  character  of  its  prin- 
cipal inhabitant ;  and  when  the  character  of  man  is  renovated,  the 
state  of  our  world  will  be  renovated  also  ;  the  agencies,  at  present 
conflicting,  will  become  conspiring;  that  which  is  barren,  will  be- 
come fruitful ;  and  that  which  is  hurtful,  will  become  beneficent. 
We  live  in  the  lively  expectation  of  a  coming  era  ;  when  the  work, 
which  the  first  man  failed  to  accomplish,  will  be  performed  by  the 
second  man,  which  is  Jesus  Christ ;  and  when  it  shall  be  sung, 
"  How  excellent  is  thy  name  in  all  the  earth." 

SECONDLY,  THE  STATE  OP  MAN  AFTER  DEATH.  The  idea  im- 
pressed on  man  by  natural  religion  is,  that  he  is  under  govern- 
ment. There  is  (1.)  a  law  prescribed  to  him  ;  and  (2.)  a  God  who 
upholds  that  law  ;  then  (3.)  a  consciousness  of  having  broken  that 
law  ;  and  (4.)  a  fear  of  punishment  to  be  inflicted  by  the  God 
whom  he  has  offended.  These  four  great  truths  of  natural  re- 
ligion point  to  a  fifth, — that  there  is  to  be  a  final  judgment. 
Every  man  feels  as  if  he  had  at  the  end  of  his  earthly  life  to 
appear  before  his  governor,  and  as  if  there  was  to  be  a  reckoning 
at  the  close  of  the  day  of  life.  The  time  and  the  manner  of  the 
judgment  are  unknown,  but  the  judgment  itself  and  the  law  are  so 
far  revealed.  There  is  a  feeling  of  this  kind — originating  in  deep, 
internal  principles,  and  strengthened  by  the  observation  of  the  in- 
stances of  retribution  in  the  providence  of  God — haunting  man- 
kind all  throughout  their  life,  and  coming  on  them  impressively 
at  a  dying  hour. 

This  we  hold  to  be  the  grand  central  feeling  of  mankind,  in 
reference  to  the  world  to  come  ;  it  is  an  expectation,  or  rather  an 
apprehension  of  a  day  of  reckoning.  Such  a  day  of  reckoning 
evidently  implies  a  future  world  and  a  separate  state.  This,  if  we 
do  not  mistake,  is  by  far  the  strongest  argument  for  a  future  life. 
We  believe  it  to  be  the  argument  which,  in  fact,  carries  conviction 
to  the  minds  of  men.  It  is  an  argument  which,  like  that  in  behalf 
of  the  existence  of  God,  looks  to  various  phenomena,  internal  and 


THE    WORLD    TO    COME.  509 

external ;  but  these  phenomena*all  pointing  in  the  one  case  as  in 
the  other,  to  one  conclusion. 

Let  it  be  observed,  that  we  are  not  stating  the  argument  as  it 
has  sometimes  been,  and  maintaining  that  there  is  injustice  in 
this  world  which  must  be  rectified  in  the  next.  We  are  not  will- 
ing to  allow  that  any  one  man  has  a  right  to  complain  of  injustice. 
There  is  in  this  world  a  government  complete,  so  far  as  it  goes, 
but  not  consummated.  It  is  complete  in  this  sense,  that  it  is  in 
exact  adaptation  to  the  character  of  man ;  but  the  character  of 
man,  and  the  Divine  administration  in  its  reference  to  it,  alike 
point  to  an  ulterior  conclusion,  towards  which  all  things  tend. 
We  see  the  process  begun  but  not  ended — the  progress,  but  not 
the  termination ;  and  we  expect,  at  the  close  of  the  passage  of 
life,  to  find  a  throne  of  judgment  set,  and  an  impartial  judge  seated 
upon  it. 

This  is  the  argument  which,  whether  they  are  able  to  state  it 
or  no,  does  carry  conviction  to  the  minds  of  mankind,  and  makes 
the  belief  in  a  future  state  so  prevalent.  It  is  an  argument  suf- 
ficient to  make  man  feel  his  responsibility  ;  for  it  reveals  the  law, 
and  makes  known  the  judge.  We  doubt  much  whether  there  be 
any  other  argument  in  favor  of  a  future  world,  which  can  stand  a 
sifting  examination,  when  viewed  as  an  independent  argument. 
Yet  when  we  have  got  such  a  firm  basis  in  the  government  of 
God,  other  considerations  worthy  of  being  weighed  come  under 
our  notice,  and  have  all  more  or  less  of  force.  There  is,  for 
instance,  the  consciousness  that  the  soul  is  not  the  body,  and  may 
not  die  with  the  body  ;  nay,  there  is  the  feeling  that  it  is  so  far 
independent  of  the  body,  that  as  it  remains  entire  in  the  midst  of 
the  struggles  of  bodily  dissolution,  so  it  may  remain  entire  when 
these  struggles  are  ended.  Socrates  expressed  this,  when  in  an- 
swer to  the  inquiry  of  his  disciples,  as  to  what  they  were  to  do 
with  him  after  he  was  dead,  he  jokingly  remarked,  "  Just  as  you 
please  ;  if  only  you  can  catch  me,  and  I  do  not  escape  you."* 

To  these  other  and,  as  we  reckon  them,  mere  subsidiary  argu- 
ments, philosophers  have  commonly  attached  the  greatest  value. 
There  is  probably  not  a  more  sublime  scene  out  of  Scripture  than 
that  in  which  Socrates  is  represented  as  conversing  with  his  dis- 
ciples on  the  day  of  his  death  on  the  subject  of  the  immortality  of 
the  soul.  Much  as  we  admire  the  conduct  of  Socrates  on  the 
occasion  referred  to,  we  are  doubtful  whether  the  arguments  em- 
*  Plato's  Phffido,  U1. 


610  THE    WORLD   TO   COME. 

ployed  by  him  are  conclusive.  *That  the  soul  existed  before  it 
came  into  the  body,  and  will  therefore  exist  after  it  leaves  the 
body  ;  that  as  life  implies  death,  so  death  must  imply  life  :  these 
are  arguments  suited  to  the  dialectic  intellect  of  the  Greeks,  but 
scarcely  fitted  to  work  conviction  in  a  doubting  mind.  The  Gi- 
rondist philosophers,  on  the  evening  before  their  execution,  tried 
hard  to  be  persuaded  by  them,  but  it  is  evident  that  there  were 
deep  anxieties  preying  on  their  mind,*  from  which  they  could  have 
been  relieved  only  by  turning  to  the  death  followed  by  the  resur* 
rection  of  one  infinitely  greater  than  Socrat.^. 

That  it  is  this  belief  in  a  coming  judgment  which  is  the  true 
natural  feeling  is  evident  from  the  conceptions  which  the  popular 
superstitions  exhibit  of  the  future  world.  The  Egyptians  placed 
a  searching  judgment-day,  conducted  by  Osiris,  on  the  foreground 
of  all  their  representations.  The  Greeks  had  a  Minos  and  Rhada- 
manthus  as  judges  in  the  region  of  the  dead.  The  other  world, 
in  the  common  conceptions  of  mankind,  has  been  the  place  of 
Shades,  and  has  had  a  Tartarus  as  well  as  an  Elysium.  The 
doctrine  of  the  transmigration  of  souls  appears  in  the  earliest  super- 
stitions of  the  world,  and  has  been  entertained  in  all  later  ages  by 
the  most  widely-diffused  forms  of  heathenism,  and,  according  to  it, 
the  soul  as  a  punishment  passes  after  death  from  one  animal  body 
to  another. 

That  the  governor  of  the  world  must  call  his  creatures  into  judg- 
ment, this  we  believe  to  be  a  natural  sentiment  ;  but  all  beyond 
this  in  relation  to  the  state  of  that  world  comes  from  perverted 
tradition,  from  the  fables  of  the  priesthood,  or  the  dreams  of  the 
wayward  spirit  of  man — always  excepting  what  conies  from 
revelation. 

Here  again  we  find  that  revealed  religion  meets  the  felt  wants 
of  natural  religion.  When  revelation  draws  aside  the  veil  which 
separates  this  world  from  the  other,  we  see,  in  exact  accordance 
with  our  natural  convictions,  a  throne  of  judgment.  And  the  Bible 
gives  certainty  to  what  is  but  a  dim  anticipation  ;  it  is  Christ  that 
brings  life  and  immortality  to  light.  It  does  more  ;  it  shows  how 
sinful  man  may  come  to  that  judgment-seat  to  be  acquitted,  and 
look  forward  to  that  judgment-seat  without  fear.  The  whole  com- 
plex feeling  with  which  man  naturally  regards  the  world  to  come 
is  one  of  apprehension  rather  than  of  hope.  It  is  a  world  of  dark- 
ness rather  than  of  light ;  nor  do  we  know  any  way  by  which 
*  See  Lamartine's  Girondists,  voL  ill 


THE    WORLD    TO   COME.  511 

these  fears  can  be  effectually  dispelled  but  by  the  rays  which  the 
Sun  of  righteousness  sheds  on  the  darkness  of  death  and  the  grave. 
Natural  religion  has  often  been  described  by  one  party  as  a  mere 
negation,  or  a  mere  syllabus  of  wants.  By  another  party  it  has 
been  represented  as  furnishing  the  basis  to  revealed  religion. 
There  is  some  truth  but  there  is  more  error,  in  each  of  these  rep- 
resentations. Natural  religion  is  not  a  mere  negation ;  it  gives 
a  God  and  a  government,  and  it  anticipates  a  future  day  of  retri- 
bution. So  far  it  gives  us  something  positive.  But  all  its  positive 
truths  only  remind  man  the  more  impressively  of  what  he  wants. 
In  this  sense  only  is  it  the  basis  of  revealed  religion,  that  its  crav- 
ing wants  are  all  satisfied  in  the  sublime  scheme  of  Christianity. 


REFERENCES  TO  AUTHORS  AND  SYSTEMS. 


ABELARD,  bis  maxim,  501. 

Academics,  461. 

Alfred  the  Great,  286. 

Alison's  Essay  on  Taste,  308. 

Alison's  Life  of  Marlborough,  215. 

Anaxagoras,  203. 

Anselm,  his  maxim,  501 . 

Aristotle,  his  principle  of  classification, 
134;  intuition  the  beginning  of  dem- 
onstration, 298. 

Arnold,  426. 

Augustine,  146, 408,  450. 

Bacon,  88, 192,  224,  380,  450. 

Bayle's  favor  for  the  theory  of  two  inde- 
pendent principles,  71. 

Bell,  Sir  Charles,  241. 

Biran,  the  importance  attached  by  him 
to  the  will,  275. 

Blair,  his  calculation  as  to  slaves  in  An-, 
cient  Italy,  263. 

Bourdaloue,  445. 

Brewster,  Sir  David,  his  rule  for  the  po- 
larizing angle  of  crystals,  121. 

Bridgewater  Treatises,  11,  23. 

Brougham,  Lord,  his  defence  of  natural 
theology  as  a  science,  35,  95,  260,  431. 

Brown,  Dr.  Thomas,  his  view  of  suffering 
examined,  39-43 ;  review  of  his  theory 
of  cause  and  effect,  90,  95-99  ;  his  view 
of  the  internal  principle  of  causation, 
128,  note ;  his  statement  as  to  the  in- 
consistency of  a  general  and  particular 
Providence,  181,  272  ;  overlooks  the 
will,  275 ;  fundamental  error  of  his 
mental  philosophy,  292;  his  view  of 
fundamental  principles,  298 ;  his  mea- 
gre views  of  the  moral  faculty,  302, 
306;  his  analysis  of  love,  317;  his 
views  of  the  influence  of  desire  on 
mental  trains,  340,  408,  427. 

Brown,  Sir  Thomas,  25,  139,  200. 

Buchanan,  Rev.  Dr.,  his  works  on  afflic- 
tion, 215. 
Bulwer,  Sir  E.  L.,  31. 


Butler,  Bishop,  16,  66,  80;  his  view  of 
the  moral  faculty,  304-311 ;  nature  of 
virtue,  313. 

Burns,  Robert,  378,  443. 

Burke,  41,  note,  58,  150,  477. 

Byron,  334,  378,  403, 405,  443. 

Calvin,  408. 

Carlyle,  56,  266,  439. 

Celsus,  60. 

Chalmers,  Dr.,  23,  66;  his  principle  as 
to  the  laws  and  collocations  of  matter, 
102,  103;  his  views  as  to  the  method 
of  answering  prayer,  232,  233  ;  of  vo- 
lition and  desire,  275,  316-318  ;  virtu- 
ous acts  must  be  voluntary,  314;  virtu- 
ous acts  must  be  done  because  virtuous, 
319  ;  emotion  becoming  morally  good 
or  evil,  343,  408. 

Channing,  hivs  ideas  of  the  grandeur  of 
human  nature,  73. 

Chateaubriand,  64,  80. 

Clarke,  Samuel,  15,  191,  219,  312,  328, 
321. 

Cicero,  11,  69,  198,  205,  211,  302,  461. 

Cleanthes,  461. 

Coleridge,  63,  280,  455,  468. 

Combe,  the  fallacies  of  his  Constitution 
of  Man,  193-196. 

Comte,  Aug.,  his  atheistic  argument  re- 
futed, 11,  note;  overlooks  causes,  94, 
119  ;  definition  of  chemistry,  138 ; 
thinks  that  positive  philosophy  is  tend- 
ing to  the  discovery  of  one  great  prin- 
ciple, 141  ;  phenomena  arranged  as 
they  are  more  or  less  complicated, 
173-180;  his  opinion  that  the  world 
could  be  improved,  268. 

Condillac,  the  error  of  his  analysis,  275. 

Cousin,  a  favorite  maxim,  21 ;  on  internal 
principle  of  causation,  98,  128,  note; 
his  views  of  the  beautiful,  147,  note  ; 
remark  on  consciousness,  272  ;  his 
view  of  the  will,  275 ;  causation  rep- 
resented as  universal,  and  yet  not  ap- 


514 


REFERENCES  TO  AUTHORS  AND  SYSTEMS. 


plicable  to  the  will,  281,  282 ;  funda- 
mental principles,  298 ;  the  moral  fac- 
ulty, 308,  309;  virtue  implying  voli- 
tion, and  desire  not  a  moral  act,  315  ; 
the  morally  good  has  an  objective  ex- 
istence, 318  ;  development  of  moral 
faculty,  320,  408,  456. 

Crabbe,  430,  431. 

Custine,  45,  380. 

Cuvier,  the  principle  on  which  he  pro- 
ceeded, 81 ;  arrangements  necessary  to 
life,  109  ;  definition  of  life,  111. 

Dalton's  law  of  definite  proportions,  121, 

138. 

Davy,  Sir  Humphrey,  208,  334. 
Derham,  11. 
Diderot,  456. 
De  Quincey,  401. 
De  Wette,  501. 

Eastern  philosophy,  70. 

Epictetus,  461. 

Edwards,  Jonathan,  connection  of  God 
with  works,  157 ;  definition  of  motive, 
279  ;  his  ridicule  of  the  self-determin- 
ing power  of  the  will,  293  ;  his  view  of 
virtue,  320,  351,  408. 

Epicurean  creed,  29,  50, 55, 157, 158,  296, 
461. 

ErsMne,  Lord  Chancellor,  417. 

Faraday,  101, 121. 

Fichte,  456. 

Foster,  John,  29,  49,  384,  440. 

Fourier,  250. 

Fresnei's  undulatory  theory,  121,  125. 

German  philosophy,  15,  94,  98, 128,  note, 

140,  142,456,  506. 
Gibbon,  56,  63,  257,  262. 
Goethe's  views  of  the  transformation  of  a 

leaf,  137. 

Greek  sophists,  69. 
Guizot,  56,  149,  229. 

Hahnemann,  334. 

Hall,  Robert,  36,  202. 

Hamilton,  Sir  William,  primary  qualities 

of  matter,  89 ;   principles  of  common 

sense,  128,  note,  and  also  at  299. 
Harris,  Dr.,  108. 
Hazlitt,  19. 
Hegel,  456,  501. 
Helvetius,  410,  412. 
Herschell,  Sir  John,  11,  note ;  his  anxiety 

to  have  the  subject  of  general  laws  and 

causation  cleared  up,  87,  96. 
Hill,  Rowland,  227. 
Hooker,  154,  470. 
Howe,  79. 
Humboldt,  119,  134,  136-138;  error  as 

to  cause  of  unity  of  Cosmos,  141,  142, 

162,  170. 


Hume,  55,  note,  56,  63 ;  sceptical  use  of 
real  facts,  71,  80,  162,  note,  228,  267, 
268 ;  error  of  his  utilitarian  theory, 
312,  378  ;  perversions  of  conscience, 
432-437,  444. 

Hunt  on  the  properties  of  rays  of  light, 
109. 

Hutcheson's   views  of  virtue,   313,  320, 

*    321,408. 

Ionian  school  of  philosophy,  141. 

Jacobi,  sets  feeling  in  opposition  to  the 

understanding,  500. 
James,  J.  A.,  432. 
Jesuits,  385,  386. 
Jouffroy,  his  view  of  the  will,  275  ;  limits 

to  human  inquiry,  290  ;  desire  no  moral 

quality,  315,  321,  408,  449. 
Justin  Martyr,  198. 

Kames,  Lord,  his  views  as  to  man  not 
being  responsible,  288. 

Kant,  94,  98,  111,  note;  the  internal 
principle  of  causation,  128,  note ;  fun- 
damental principles,  298,  408,  500. 

Keith's  Land  of  Israel,  466. 

Kepler's  laws,  113,  120,  122-124,  139; 
his  ideas  as  to  order  in  world,  141. 

Lamartine,  64,  510. 

Leechman,  228. 

Leibnitz,  13,  81 ;  activity  of  matter,  90; 
his  Theodicee,  152;  doctrine  of  pre- 
established  harmony,  190,  191. 

Lewes,  435. 

Locke,  273. 

Lucretius,  170. 

Lyell,  Sir  Charles,  105. 

Macau!  ay,  defective  views  as  to  answer 
to  prayer,  214,  note;  perversions  of 
conscience,  432-435. 

Mackinnon  on  civilization,  263. 

Mackintosh,  Sir  James,  15,  66,  128,  note, 
285  ;  fundamental  principles,  298 ;  de- 
fective views  of  the  moral  faculty,  802— 
311,  305,  408. 

Maclagan,  Professor,  458. 

Maistre,  De,  59. 

Malthus,  428. 

Matteucci,  111. 

M'Crie,  Dr.,  his  sagacity,  149. 

Mill,  James,  275  ;  John  Stuart,  91,  note, 
103,  note. 

Miller,  Hugh,  165,  412. 

Milton,  370,  376,  405. 

Montesquieu,  56,  149. 

Morell,  19,  456;  review  of  his  intuitional 
theology,  501-506. 

Neander,  60,  501. 

Newton,  Sir  Isaac,  14;  his  discoveries 
113-124,  137. 


•; 


REFERENCES    TO    AUTHORS    AND    SYSTEMS. 


515 


Nichol,  Professor,  108. 
Niebuhr,  13,44,  259. 
North  British  Review,  221. 

Oken's  physio-philosophy,  134. 
Owen,  Rev.  John,  408. 
Owen,  Professor,  his  views  as  to  arche- 
types, 135,  136. 
Owen,  R.,  250. 

Paley,  11,23,  39,40,  137. 

Pantheism,  22,  63,  64,  218-226,  456-458. 

Pascal,  67,  76,  85. 

Payne,  Dr.,  his  views  of  volition,  275. 

Peripatetics,  461. 

Pharisees,  55. 

Philosophy  of  the  Plan  of  Salvation,  484. 

Plato,  evil  a  limitation  of  the  Divine 
power,  72 ;  world  an  animal.  111  ; 
archetypal  forms,  135,  139,  141,  292, 
461,  502,  509.  • 

Pliny  the  Elder,  68. 

Plutarch,  57,  201 ;  his  treatise  on  super- 
stition, 218-225. 

Pythagorean  views  of  number,  139,  141. 

Ray,  11. 

Reid,  Dr.  Thomas,  statement  of  the  the- 

istic   argument,   11;    causation,    128; 

fundamental  principles,  298;  analysis 

of  the  moral  powers,  320,  321,  408. 
Reynolds,  Bishop,  on  the  affections,  382, 

397. 

Robertson,  56,  149. 
Rochefoucault,  410,  411. 
Roland,  Madame,  256,  note. 
Rousseau,  49,  63,  64,  228,  303,  878,  444. 

Sadducees,  50,  55. 
Schelling,  14,  456. 
Schleiermacher,  500,  501. 
Scott,  Sir  Walter,  149,  400. 
Sevigne,  55. 


Shelley,  49,  378. 

Shenstone,  266. 

Simon,  St.,  250. 

Smith,  Adam,  149,  302,  428 ;  perversions 

of  conscience,  432-438. 
Somerville,  Mrs.,  388. 
Socrates,  10,  509,  510. 
Southey,  386. 
Stoic  philosophy,  29,  55,  211,  296,  331, 

461. 

Strauss,  456. 
Stewart,  Dugald,  fundamental  principles, 

128,  note,  298  ;  the  moral  faculty,  320, 

408,  415. 
Swainson,  138. 
Swift,  417. 

Taylor,  Isaac,  171,  191,  206. 

Taylor,  Jeremy,  424. 

Thiers,  22,  note,  62. 

Thomson's  Castle  of  Indolence,  266. 

Thucydides,  255. 

Thugs,  385. 

Todd  and  Bowman's  Physiology,  134. 

Tucker,  192. 

Turner's  Anglo-Saxons,  til. 

Vestiges  of  Creation,  93,  94. 
Vinet,  21,  54,  390,  408,  409. 
Volney,  69. 
Voltaire,  56,  63,  64,  378. 

Wardlaw's  Christian  Ethics,  409. 

Whately,  250. 

Whewell,  95,  106,  111,  note;  review  of 
his  Philosophy  of  the  Inductive  Sci- 
ences, 119-125,  131;  definition  of  a 
type,  134;  fundamental  principles,  299. 

Wordsworth,  480. 

Xenophanes,  28. 

Young's  undulatory  theory,  121, 125. 


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